


Truth or Consequences

by OriginalCeenote, vextant



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: (Only the Bad Guys), Alternate Universe - Historical, Alternate Universe - Western, But There Are Some Pretty Obscure References, Canonical Character Death, Captain America Reverse Big Bang 2018, Comics/MCU Blend, Enemies to Friends, Enemies to Lovers, Gen, Gen or Pre-Slash, M/M, Marvel Cameos, Minor Character Death, Perhaps even, Pre-Steve Rogers/Sam Wilson, Sam Wilson-centric, Steve Rogers & Sam Wilson Friendship, There Are No Original Characters Here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-08
Updated: 2018-06-08
Packaged: 2019-05-08 22:53:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 27,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14704146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OriginalCeenote/pseuds/OriginalCeenote, https://archiveofourown.org/users/vextant/pseuds/vextant
Summary: It’s 1871. Local sheriff Samuel T. Wilson arrests newcomer and troublemaker Steven G. Rogers. It turns out they’re each holding onto the past in their own way, and together they might even one day start to look towards the future. But first - Rogers is going to need to make bail.





	1. Once Upon a Time in the West

**Author's Note:**

> My first ever Bang fic, for [wonderful art](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14707956) by [OriginalCeeNote](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OriginalCeeNote)!
> 
> Thank you to all the folks at the CapRBB Slack for cheerleading and workshopping with me, especially the fantastic [glasscaskets](https://archiveofourown.org/users/glasscaskets). Thank you to my lovely beta, [follow_the_sun](https://archiveofourown.org/users/follow_the_sun), for poking holes in my grammar and formatting. And thank you all for reading, hope you enjoy. :)
> 
> ( [Here is the playlist I built while writing, if anyone is interested in some mood music](https://open.spotify.com/user/mlf9412dgzv4abweyjtxvgs2h/playlist/6yQZ6KUh0n2hmyiaEUowgQ?si=WQSXd-UuS620Hm76AHXgZw)! )

**_1871_ **

Sam swaggers in to the saloon after the sun’s gone down, pleased to see that his normal place is empty. He nods to Natasha behind the bar and takes the tan hat off of his head, fanning himself with it. “Hot one tonight, don’t you think?”  
  
“It’ll cool off yet,” she says as she slides over to him. “Drink?”

He gives her a friendly smile and nods to the silver star pinned to his shirt pocket. “Nothin’ alcoholic. I’m on duty.”

“You’re always on duty nowadays,” says Natasha, as she pulls a glass from under the bar and wipes it clean.

Riley used to refer to Apache Springs as a six-horse team packed into a one-horse town. More than enough excitement for any one man to handle despite there being only a crossroads and maybe a couple dozen real buildings to its name.

They have what matters, though. Homes, real homes, built of smooth adobe mud and land fenced by chicken wire and stone hauled in from the deserts; a casino, although it doubles as a boarding house where some of the ladies in town sell their services for the cowboys and travelers passing through. (There’s no gold left in the west anyway– if you want to get rich, you’ve got to mine those who’ve already made their fortunes.) They’ve got a livery stable, albeit a small one with only about a dozen stalls, and a blacksmith. A telegraph office, even. It sits in a sideroom of the general store, which makes a good living too now that the road south runs straight through to El Paso.

The newest addition, thanks to Riley’s insistence before–well, _before_ –is a little stone jailhouse with three cells. Not that Sam ever really needs to arrest anybody, of course, but as the only law left in this town anymore he likes to wear the keys on his belt for show more than anything.

Natasha runs the boardinghouse, has for a few months now. She’s got a sharp tongue and a quick wit and Sam appreciates that she’s stopped trying to swindle him when they play cards. She sets a sarsaparilla in front of him with a disapproving quirk of her eyebrow.

“Thank you,” Sam says, and takes a sip. It’s not _cold_ but it’s not sweltering hot like it’s been outside, so it’s as refreshing as he imagines pure ice would be.

“You need a deputy, Sam. You’ve been sober too long and you’re no fun this way.”

“Not my job to be fun.” He’s a bit defensive, a little bitter because she brings it up about once a week, but Natasha can take it. “But thank you for your concern.”

“You haven’t been drunk since Ril-”

“ _Thank you,_ Miss Romanoff,” he says curtly, “that’s enough.”

She shrugs at him in that ‘not my fault if you don’t listen’ way of hers and returns to her other patrons. Sam sips his drink, staring into the glass once he sets it down.

They’ve got an understanding, he and Natasha. She doesn’t press him too hard about his job and he doesn’t ask too many questions about her girls. Wouldn’t do to have the sheriff make too nice with any one constituent, anyhow. Can’t afford to play favorites when it’s only him around.

The saloon has a curtain that acts as a door. Keeps the hot air out and the not-as-hot air in. Sam can hear it rustle as someone enters and he glances around to guess who it might be. All the regulars are here: the ladies grabbing a bite to eat before they start up for the night, the older fellows gathered around the poker tables. Looks like Sharon’s on duty to deal tonight. Their impending losses don’t befront Sam much, as long as they don’t get too rowdy about it.

(Sharon, Maria, Natasha, all the girls can handle themselves. Sam just doesn’t want to have to arrest anybody tonight. It’s the closest he’s gotten to off-duty in months.)

Nick Fury, the rancher with a big parcel of land up north, keeps to himself mostly. Sometimes his cowhands stumble in late at night, but it’s early yet and the sun’s only just set; they probably won’t be done for a couple hours. Doc Banner skipped town a while ago, and the Baron tends not to leave his forge without an entourage.

Sam turns towards to the door to get a glance at the newcomer. The big, blond, pale mountain of a man in his pressed shirt and shined brown boots, like every speck of dust in New Mexico just bounces clean off. He hesitates at the door. Looks doubtful, like maybe he doesn’t actually want to come in, but he’s already made a spectacle of himself just standing there breathing.

“Close the damned curtain!” shouts someone from the cards tables. Sam thinks it might’ve been Happy Hogan.

The newcomer looks startled and takes a step inside, carefully tugging the cloth door closed behind him. Natasha steps out from behind the bar and greets him with a smile. “Come on in, stranger. Get you a drink?”

She’s practically purring like a housecat, because she knows an easy target when she sees one. Man’s got money, clearly, and looks so lost he’s almost dazed– he’s about to find himself waist deep in trouble and Sam’s in no mood to educate some city-slick passerby. It always does the town good for those kinda folks to pass on through and leave with their wallets a little lighter.

“Uh,” says the stranger, “yeah. Sure, thanks.”

Natasha leads him to a stool at the bar, far enough so Sam can still keep to himself but close enough so that he can eavesdrop.

“What’s your poison?”  
  
“I’m not picky. But cold, if you can, it’s hotter’n hell out there.” The stranger chuckles, but it’s nervous and the laugh Natasha throws him is mostly out of mercy.

“No ice,” she says. It’s not an apology.

“‘Course not. Wouldn’t want to impose.” He glances around and quickly takes off his hat like it’s burned him. “Whatever you have is fine with me.”

Sam watches Natasha send a pointed look in his direction as she turns to fill the man’s order. He knows that look and it says ‘it’s always the idiots who are easy on the eyes’, and where he’d normally join in he just rolls his eyes and ignores her because he’s still sour from that deputy comment.

“So where do you hail from, stranger?”

“Brooklyn,” the man replies, toying with the felt edge of his hat. “Uh, New York City, miss.”

She sets his drink down in front of him and leans a little on the bar. “Just Natasha. We’re not so formal out here.”

He’s got that look on his face that every man of his type has at this point– that realization of ‘gee, she’s being awfully friendly’ right before they mistake it for genuine attraction. Natasha likes it that way. Sam thinks he’s seeing something else instead though, something more like suspicion.

The stranger takes a sip of his drink and the reaction is immediate. He tries to tamper it down, they all do, but it’s obvious in the way he strangles out a fake cough and blinks quick a couple of times. He puts the glass down to stare at it. “What the hell’s in that?”

“We call it cactus wine,” Natasha says coolly and Sam has to clear his throat to avoid a laugh. “It’s tequila and peyote.”

“It’s a little strong.”

She waves off the accusation. “You gonna tell me your name or am I gonna have to keep calling you ‘stranger’?”

“It’s Rogers.” He puffs his chest out a little bit to take another sip, and even though he’s prepared this time he still has to muffle a little cough afterwards. “Steve.”

“What brings you to town, Steve?”

Rogers brings his glass to his lips again, and Christ, this dumb mother’s going to try to muscle his way through the whole drink. There’s no reaction this time though, because there’s something distant in his eyes as he weighs his answer. Finally he says, “I’m. . . looking for somebody. Thought he might’ve passed through here on his way to El Paso.”

“Recently?” Natasha’s interest is piqued, somewhat because she’s naturally nosey but mostly because she makes half her living off of this kind of thing. She calls it ‘information’; Sam calls it what it is– gossip.

“Maybe the last year or so? I don’t know, we-” Rogers swallows. “We weren’t in touch.”

“Well, that there’s our sheriff,” Natasha says, and _damn_ her for dragging Sam into this. “He’s been around since Apache Springs was just tents.”

Rogers’ posture straightens at the mention of a lawman, and Sam knows right then and there that he’s trouble. Only two kinds of people have that kind of reaction to the law– the do-gooders and the troublemakers. Sam hasn’t seen enough to peg which one Rogers is yet. His clean-cut type could be either, maybe one of those criminals who fashions themselves after eastern gentlefolk, but whichever way it goes it means that Sam’s quiet night is out the window for certain.

He curses Natasha under his breath. She fires him a look like she heard him plainly from near ten foot away.

Just as Sam starts to think he’s wasting too much thought on this stranger, Rogers slides onto the stool right beside him, half-empty glass in hand. “Pardon me, Sheriff,” he says all proper, and Sam’s so miffed he can’t even bring himself to meet the man’s eyes, “but did a kid named Bucky Barnes come through here recently?”

“Who the hell’s Bucky Barnes?” Sam says as he downs the rest of his drink.

“He would’ve been with the army, might’ve called himself James-” Rogers stops himself and puffs up a little, eyeing Sam’s glass. “-Are you drinking on the job?”

It sounds like ‘ _jahb_ ’ when Rogers says it in that ridiculous pinched accent of his, all _New Yawk City_ , and luckily Sam’s had years of practice to control himself, otherwise he might’ve just slugged the guy square in the nose and been done with it.

“It’s just soda,” he grits out, “so calm yourself. Stranger.”

There’s none of the warmth that Natasha poured into the word. Rogers is an outsider here, Sam doesn’t need to defend himself to a passerby, especially when it comes to doing his job. Sam Wilson doesn’t start fights– no matter how bad the other guy is spoiling for one.

Natasha comes over to take the empty glass, slides him a refill. She’s keeping an eye on the situation but the last thing Sam needs right now is a supervisor.

“I’m sorry,” Rogers says, and it’s so out of the blue, Sam whips his head around to look right at him. “I had no right to assume.”

Sam watches him offer his hand, taking in the bright, genuine blue of his eyes, and briefly wonders how many ladies Rogers’ got waiting for him back east. Something about the look in his eyes makes you want to agree with him.

Luckily, Sam’s real good at saying no.

He takes Rogers’ hand anyway and shakes it. “Haven’t heard of a James or Bucky Barnes pass through here, ever,” he offers as his own apology, still bristling a little from the encounter, “and I’ve been around a while.”

“It’s alright, it was a long shot.” Rogers turns back to the bar to nurse his drink like a big sad dog. Sam’s perfectly content to leave him be now that he’s got his answer, albeit one he obviously didn’t want.

“Hope you’re not planning on riding out to El Paso tonight.” Natasha slides her way back into the conversation like she never left.

Rogers offers her a small smile. “Nah, the coach already went on without me.”

“We’ve got rooms open, if you’re interested. Company, too.” She winks at him. He looks like he doesn’t know how to react to her attention all of a sudden.

“N-no, I–just the room.” He reaches for his wallet.

From across the room, there’s a shout, “Hey, slick! Yeah, you, stranger!”

Sam turns his head to see Percy– maybe it’s William? They’re identical, after all–Grimes waving to get Rogers’ attention. He and his all look like they’ve just wrapped up a game over at the cards tables.

“What d’you want, Grimes?” Natasha says, and it carries across the room even though she barely has to raise her voice.

“M’not talking to you, Romanoff. Slick! You play?”

Rogers looks at Natasha like he’s asking for permission. She shrugs her shoulders, but Sam knows she’s just revelling in the attention. “Just remember you’ve got a drink and a room to pay for.”

“Not going to be a problem, ma’am.” He sets his hat back on his head with a smile like he knows a secret and stands to make his way over to the tables, “Alright, fellas, deal me in. And I need a quick refresher on the rules.”

The men at the card table cheer and guffaw as he takes his seat among them. Sam watches Rogers get slapped so hard on the back that his drink sloshes.

“They’re going to eat him alive,” Sam tells Natasha.

“I wouldn’t be so sure,” she says. “You might want to stick around, find out who fleeces who.”

“Seems I’ve got to, at this point. Rogers is trouble, I just don’t know what kind.” He throws her a playful smile. “Underneath all that ‘yes ma’am, no ma’am’ you seem to like.”

“Samuel Wilson, you shut your mouth.”

“You’ll do well to call me by my title, Miss Romanoff.”

“Of course, Sheriff. How could anyone ever forget?” she says with a real smile, the one she only reserves for close friends or favorite customers. Sam’s not really sure which category he falls in most days, but he smiles back.

He’d meant to wander off after a drink or two, maybe head back to the jail and check on the singular prisoner, but with Rogers and his thick skull hanging around, Sam figures he’d better stay.  The boys at the cards tables roar in laughter at something somebody said. Sharon laughs too, and Sam knows even from here that she’ll be making eyes at Rogers all night and trying to keep the other girls off of him.

“You’ve got that look on your face,” Natasha says, cutting him out of his thoughts. “You’re thinking too hard.”

He watches her wipe down the bar and jerks his head back towards the ruckus. “What d’you reckon?”

“What? Rogers?” She looks thoughtful a moment, but Sam’s no fool. He’s never known Natasha to take her time making her mind up about somebody. “I think he plays his cards close to his vest, y’know? Says he wasn’t in touch with his boy, but something lit a fire under his ass to come all the way out here.”

“Mm. And he’s spoiling for a fight.”

“You think everybody’s spoiling for a fight.”

Sam grunts in response, because she’s right– but so is he.

That’s when the whole place goes silent. There’s a hush over the patrons, like everyone in the room is holding their breath.

So Sam can hear from clear across the room as Al Killian’s chair scrapes back and he snarls, “You wanna run that by me again, stranger?”

“I _said_ ,” and damn it to hell, of course it’s Rogers, the big blond idiot rising as well, “you wanna roll your sleeves for me there, pal?”

Killian stalks around the table to step up to Rogers, chest to chest.

“Alright, gentlemen,” Sam says as he heads over to them with his hands up, “watch your tempers. What’s the problem?”

“Slick here’s accusing me of cheating!” Killian hisses like a wet cat.

“I wouldn’t have to if you didn’t keep winning with impossible hands,” says Rogers calmly, even as he towers over him. “I fought the Rebels, I know what cowards and cheaters look like.”

It’s hard to tell which part of that was the worst, but the whole sentence was just about the most inciting thing a man like Rogers could say in this very moment, here, so far south a man could spit and hit Mexico proper. Sam throws Natasha his best ‘I told you so’ look. She doesn’t look impressed, and he turns back to try and calm the two men down.

Killian’s crew is goading him on: “Come on, get him, Al, smack him around a little, that’ll show him.” They’re edging in, and the whole saloon has gathered around to make a circle around Sam, Killian, and Rogers.

“Come on, fellas-” Sam starts to say, but there’s no time to finish the statement because Killian’s already swung, wide and sweeping. He’s been drinking, and he’s a land broker, not a fighter.

Rogers leans back out of range easily. He’s not fixing to fight back, but Sam’s not about to be praising the man who picked this fight on account of his sudden pacifism.

Somebody knocks Rogers’ hat off his head from behind him and he turns to look– giving Al his chance to clock him right across the jaw this time. Rogers stumbles back a step. The crowd jeers.

“Rogers-” Sam gets out as he gets pulled into the mob–

“Come on, pretty boy, take a swing,” Killian yells, red-faced with his fists up.

Rogers sets his jaw, takes a step forward and just– just picks him up. Not with a grunt or a huff or any noise a man would conceivably make picking up another grown man, just grabs Al by his shirt collar and lifts him clean off the ground with both hands. Like he weighs nothing.

A couple of cards fall from Killian’s shirt sleeve and flutter down to the floor like feathers.

The mob goes silent.

“That’s what I thought,” says Rogers, and just– _tosses_ him across the room. Killian crashes into a cards table, breaking it with the impact, and tumbles ass over teakettle onto the floor.

Everyone in the room’s staring at Rogers like he’s some kind of super-man and honestly, Sam even lets himself gape for just a second before snapping his mouth shut.

“You’re under arrest,” he says, jabbing a finger in his direction. Rogers nods and ducks his head like he suddenly has the decency to look _bashful_ , like he didn’t mean it.

Sam isn’t buying that for a minute. He turns to address Killian, but the broker’s just laying on the floor groaning. Thank God, at least he’s alive; Sam hasn’t had to execute anybody yet and he isn’t eager to start. He points to the two of Al’s friends standing closer to him. “You two, get him to Blake. I’ll deal with him later.”

He marches back up to Rogers and levels him with his best glare. “Do I need to cuff you?”

“No.” Good, the mountain of a man has tucked his hands in his pockets. If Rogers regrets his actions it’ll make for some quiet jail time. “I’ll come. Peacefully.”

As Sam leads him to the bar, Rogers says to Natasha, “Guess I won’t need the room.”

“You still owe me for the drink.”

Before Rogers can speak up again Sam says, “I’ll add it to his bail,” and gives his prisoner a gentle shove out the door.

Night’s fallen over Apache Springs by now, which means it’s cooled off significantly. Sam suppresses a shiver as the chill hits him. He hadn’t meant to stay at the saloon so long.

With an amused little smile Rogers turns to Sam and says, “You still post bail all the way out here?”

“I’m the last person in this town you want to pick a fight with, Rogers,” huffs Sam. “We’re a territory, we ain’t lawless.”

“Alright,” he says, “I’m sorry.”

“No, you ain’t.”

Rogers chuckles.

Riley’s little jailhouse is right up the street– the only street, after all the town’s really just a crossroads– and there’s a familiar young face peeking out the window.

Sam shoves Rogers in first. Maybe a little too hard, but he takes it like a champ. Joaquin, the scruffy teenager that Sam’s bribed with jams and candies to keep an eye on the _other_ prisoner, is sitting on the desk, kicking his legs.

“<Hey,>” he says, and that’s all the warning Sam gets before the kid bursts into rapid Spanish, “<You’ve been gone a lot longer than you said you were going to. I kept an eye on the place just like you said, but Ma was expecting me home for dinner, you know. My sister stopped by to ask about it, and I told her no, Sheriff told me to keep an eye on the place, so you know you owe me double the next time you ask.>”

The boy cuts himself off when the lock on Rogers’ cell clicks open, pausing only to take a breath before he starts up again. “<Who’s the white guy? Is he arrested? What’d he do? Did he kill somebody?>”

“<Joaquin,>” says Sam as he gives Rogers another once-over to make sure he’s gotten all of his effects, “<that’s too many questions. How was Rollins?>”

“Jack’s just fine,” the man in the other cell says in drawling English. “A bit hungry.”

“<So _boring_ ,>” Joaquin whines right through Rollins’ complaining. “<He understands just fine but he won’t say a word of Spanish back to me, it’s like trying to pull a horse out of the mud.>”

“<That’s enough,>” Sam practically has to yank the kid off the desk to get him to the door once he’s finished locking Rogers away. “<Thank you. I’ll get you double next time.>”

Joaquin plants his feet right outside the threshold and squares up his shoulders. “<Triple.>”

“<Double,>” Sam says firmly. “<Go home.>” He closes the door.

Rogers takes his seat on the bench, stripped of everything but his shirt, boots, and trousers. There’s even a blanket in case he needs to keep warm. Sam takes his effects– coat, hat, wallet, keys, probably to a luggage case, some other trinkets– and locks them in the bottom drawer of the desk.

He sighs. It’s going to be a long night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Historical Notes:
> 
> > There is a real town in New Mexico called Apache Springs, but it’s not this one. The title of the fic comes from the very real, much bigger town of Truth or Consequences, to the south. It was named after a radio play, but pre-radio it was called Geronimo Springs. Since this is 1871, and Geronimo’s not quite famous yet (that would come in the 1880s), our fake town is named Apache Springs. The half a dozen or so tribes that originally occupied the land are often collectively (and somewhat misleadingly) referred to as the [Chiricahua](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiricahua) Apache. 
> 
> > On building materials : it was hard to get things like wood and glass out in the edge of the desert, so in the deep southwest a lot of settlements built buildings out of [adobe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adobe)– baked mud, basically. (Its versatility is what inspired the software company of the same name.) In small towns, it was very common for businesses to share buildings– hence the saloon/boardinghouse and the general store/telegraph office. Windows could be covered in wax paper and even just cloth to keep the heat out.
> 
> > On ice : it was popular for old west saloons to advertise cool beer, not cold beer, because ice was incredibly hard to come by. Technically, they weren’t lying.
> 
> > Cactus wine : was a [very real drink](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_saloon#Alcohol). Steve should’ve known better than to tell a Southwestern bartender (or any bartender, really) “whatever you have”. That’s how you get rotgut, Steven.
> 
> > Percy and William Grimes were the second pair of [The Brothers Grimm](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brothers_Grimm_\(comics\)), Marvel Comic villains in the mid-late 80s. They had magic powers granted by their costumes.
> 
> > Steve’s “fight” with Al(drich) Killian is very heavily inspired by a story Patton Oswalt tells in his special Annihilation.
> 
> > [Joaquin Torres](http://marvel.wikia.com/wiki/Joaquin_Torres_\(Earth-616\)) is the second Falcon in Marvel comics, introduced in Captain America: Sam Wilson (2015).


	2. A Fistful of Dollars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rogers gets bailed out, but it comes with strings attached.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [A playlist, for some mood music](https://open.spotify.com/user/mlf9412dgzv4abweyjtxvgs2h/playlist/6yQZ6KUh0n2hmyiaEUowgQ?si=WQSXd-UuS620Hm76AHXgZw).
> 
> When a character speaks < in angle brackets >, they are speaking Spanish. Pretty much everyone but Steve speaks Spanish in this town.
> 
> There's some money talk in this chapter. You can hover over an underlined amount to see the equivalent in 2018 USD.

“Listen, Sheriff Wilson, if I may-”

“No you may _not_ ,” Sam says sharply from where he sits, his feet propped up on the desk, revolver in his lap. He’s got all six bullets lined up in front of him as he wipes out the cylinder with a rag.

Rogers actually has the audacity to stand up straight and look offended. Rollins lets out a wheezy laugh from his own cell.

“I’m just trying to make a case-”

“The more you talk, the higher your bail gets.”

That makes him stop a minute. He’s been pacing his cell like an animal since breakfast this morning. Sam’s been getting tired just watching him, but Rogers has just been getting antsier as the sun rises higher.

With his hands on the bars, Rogers asks, curious, “Well, what’s it at right now?”

“Now?” Sam picks a number out of the air. “Four dollars.”

Rollins cackles. Rogers gives him a soft, “You shut your mouth,” before he rounds back on Sam. “Christ, why’s it so high? What’re the charges?”

“Battery,” Sam starts out with, because that one’s easy, but then he has to think a little bit. “Physical assault. Verbal assault - of a peace officer, at that. _De_ struction of property. _Ob_ struction of justice-”

Rogers seethes, “ _Obstruction_ -!”

“-And theft,” he finishes. It’s technically true, he did leave the saloon last night without paying for his drink. Being arrested might’ve had something to do with it, but Sam’s trying to make a point.

“You’re embellishing the truth, is what you’re doing. It’s not like I _shot_ somebody - all I did was catch a cheater!”

“Four and a quarter,” Sam says, leveling a look at his prisoner. Rogers slams the bars in frustration.

“I _did_ shoot somebody,” Rollins drawls. He’s lazing on the adobe bench in his own cell, one leg propped up, arm thrown over his eyes to keep the sun from the window out. “He damn near died, but here I am.”

“ _You’ve_ got a judge comin’ to pick you up in a few days, Jack,” says Sam, pointing the empty revolver frame at him, “and you’re lucky Jasper’s a tough son of a bitch, otherwise I’d just hang you and be done with it.”

Rollins sits up at that, with a skeptical look on his face. “Jasper Sitwell is the _dumbest_ son of a bitch this town’s ever seen. Asides from slick, here.”

“Hey!”

Sam glances over at Rogers and casually says, “Four-fifty, now.” Rogers holds his hands up and steps away from the bars, snapping his flap shut, finally. It’s an angry surrender, but Sam’ll take all the peace he can get at this point.

“You know what I think?” Rollins says, pointing a finger at Sam this time.

Mostly because he’s got nothing better to do besides bait Rogers some more, Sam indulges him with a sigh. “What _do_ you think, Jack?”

“I think _you’re_ the one who got lucky that Sitwell’s still alive. You wanna be a good sheriff, the lawman the town needs, like Riley was, right? But you don’t really wanna give some fool a California collar, do ya? Not so soon. And what if he’s innocent? Then _you’d_ be the murderer.”

“Man, shut the hell up,” Sam says, careful not to sound too defensive even though the words cut him right down to his core. He’s aware of Roger’s sharp eyes on him. Sliding the rounds back into the cylinder, he manages to force a bored look on his face and snaps it back into place in the frame. Rollins shrugs and tugs on his shirt collar to fan himself, not too concerned.

They sit in silence for a while, none of them wanting to be the first to break it. Sam tries to think about anything else, but the image in his mind keeps calling back to near three days ago, when he’d heard a gunshot and come running up to see Sitwell facedown in the dirt and Jack with a smoking pistol.

His first thought had been _please, don’t make me kill somebody for this_. Even if it was a sadistic piece of shit like Jack Rollins. Then the Doc had come up, big hands and long blonde hair pulled back, and he’d said “through-and-through” (thank God) and “he’ll live” (thank _God_ ). Blake had snapped him out of it enough to lock Rollins away and help carry Sitwell to the small dirt-floor clinic that used to be Bruce Banner’s.

(‘Dirt floor’, like that was notable around here. It’s on the edge of the damned desert, all there is is dirt.)

Rollins is right, though. Sam doesn’t want to be a murderer, no matter if the job requires it. He’s never held lives in his hands like this. Not before a couple of months ago, when some bastard ambushed the late sheriff on the way back from Albuquerque and left him to bleed out on the edge of town like a stuck deer. Now every fight, every dispute, hell, it feels like damn near every decision for almost five hundred people is on Sam’s shoulders. He doesn’t have Riley anymore, with his rigid sense of right and wrong and the charisma to smooth over the roughest things.

It’s only Sam now, and he’s not sure he’s ready to fill Riley’s boots. He doesn’t know if he’ll ever feel ready. But he’s got to because there’s no one else.

He likes to think he’s done pretty well so far.

“I’ll pay it,” Rogers says quietly. It’s hardly more than a whisper, but it snaps Sam back into himself so fast that his head starts to spin.

“What?”

Rogers clears his throat to repeat himself, “I’ll pay it. Gimme my wallet, I’ll pay the bail. I’ve got to be on my way.”

Sam’s still got the revolver, cleaned and loaded now, in his hands. It’s hard not to be annoyed at the clipped tone in the other man’s voice. He’s given nothing but lip all morning. Setting his bail at something ridiculous, ten or even twenty dollars, would show him, and Sam’s got half a mind to say it. No one would stop him.

But he won’t abuse his position.

So he looks Rogers dead in the eye and says, “I’m sorry. All I heard is that you can’t pay.”

He won’t abuse his position _too much_.

“Not without my wallet,” growls Rogers, low and deep in that big barrel chest of his, “which you’ve got in your desk there.”

There’s a knock on the door, so Sam stands to answer it. “Now, how’re you gunna pay without your wallet?”

Rogers slams the bars again, “God _damn_ you, this is time-sensitive, I’ve got to get going-”

“ _‘Time-sensitive’_ ,” mocks Sam. The knock gets louder, more insistent, and he turns back a little as he opens the curtain. “You can rot in there for all I care, you troublemaker.”

“Oh, man,” he hears Rollins cackle behind him, “What’d you do to piss sheriff off so bad?”

The Baron himself is on the other side of the door. It’s not a formal title, he’s only called that because he owns the land the town is built on and thousands of acres more besides. Rumor has it that his father is Howard Stark, the railroad baron from the east. Sam doesn’t believe the rumors and anyway it’s far more likely he’d run his mouth too much and just annoyed the Apache into clearing out. Well, that and the man speaks Spanish like he was born to it, like no easterner ever could.

Sam blinks for a minute, because seeing the Baron in person rather than a runner or a manservant of some kind in his place is a strange occasion on its own.

“<Heard you stopped a fight,>” he says, before Sam can get his bearings. He’s glancing around him at the two prisoners inside. “<I take it he’s the big one? How much, I want him.>”

“What?” Sam says, stepping out and letting the cloth door slide shut behind him. It takes him a moment to switch back from all the English he’s been speaking today, and even then he’s not quite sure what Baron wants. There’s a large heavy canvas sheet propped up over the face of the jailhouse, providing some shade, so at least they’re out of the sun.

“<The big guy, he’s the one from the fight, right? At Romanoff’s? How much? I’ll pay.>”

“<How much what?>”

“<His _bail_ , Sheriff.>” Baron tsks and snaps his fingers like Sam’s too slow for him. “<How much. Is. His bail?>”

Sam shrugs. “<Don’t know yet. I’ve been jacking it up every time he pisses me off.>”

“<Oh, a troublemaker, eh.>” The Baron is grinning like a jackal now, and it makes Sam plant his feet a little more solid in front of the door. “<Perfect, I need a troublemaker.>”

“<They are both rightfully imprisoned. I’ve got a circuit judge coming in a few days, I’m not releasing either of them before then.>” It wasn’t the truth, necessarily - Rogers, as much a bastard as he is, hasn’t done anything to warrant a formal trial. But Sam is ready to say just about anything to get the Baron off his back. The man’s a dog with a bone.

“<I don’t give a jack-rabbit shit about Rollins. Wasn’t he running with that skeleton crew, the bandits? I don’t want a real criminal, Wilson, I want the guy who threw Al Kilian into a table and _broke_ the table. >”

“<And I’m telling you, you can’t have him->”

The Baron’s ignoring him and already pushing past him into the jailhouse to stand in front of Rogers’ cell with his hands planted on his hips. Rogers himself is sitting on the bench with his arms crossed over his chest, seemingly resigned. At the intrusion, he looks up and narrows his eyes at the newcomer, then looks to Sam like it’s some trick of his.

“<What’s your name>?”

Rogers is still looking at Sam, and it’s taking every last ounce of Sam’s self-control to not haul the Baron out of there by his pressed collar. Since the prisoner isn’t talking, Sam says, slowly and in English, “Rogers. He’s from New York.”

Rogers’ expression shifts a moment, as if he only just realized that they were talking about him with the inclusion of his name. Sam files that away for later. What was he thinking? Coming all the way to New Mexico not knowing any Spanish? Looking for some kid he hasn’t even kept correspondence with?

“< _Bah_ , English,>” says Baron, waving Sam away as if to dismiss him, as if he somehow isn’t involved with this conversation. To Rogers he says, “<Stand up.>”

The prisoner gets to his feet, but mostly because the Baron’s hand motions made it obvious.

“What’s this about?” he says.

“Your bail,” says Sam, ignoring the Baron’s petulant glare.

“I am paying it,” the Baron says in lilted but authoritative English before turning to Sam. “How much?”

Rogers starts to speak up, “Four and a hal-”

“Oh, it’s an even five now,” Sam bristles. His hand is on his gun, but he takes it off and tucks his thumb in his belt once he realizes. It gets both of them to shut up for a second at least. Rogers is still glaring at him, but he doesn’t care. “And I can’t let you take him, Baron.”

“ _Crísto_ ,” says the Baron, “people really do say that? ‘ _Antonio_ ’, only Tony, please, I have a normal name the same as you. None of that-” He waves his hand to finish his statement for him in the absence of words.

Sam realizes right then that he’s never heard anyone call the Baron that to his face in his life. It’s enough to make him freeze a moment before he sees Baron-Antonio-Tony, _whatever_ , reaching into his jacket pocket and pulling out his wallet. “Hey, hey, I said no. You can’t pay his bail, you don’t know him.”

Tony whips around to face Rogers again, as if they could suddenly and without Sam’s knowledge fabricate that they’ve known each other all along. Rogers just shrugs. Tony mutters, “<I hope you’re more useful than your brain alone.>”

“I don’t think that’s a requirement,” says Rogers, real soft, “having to know who you’re bailing out.”

With a snap of his fingers, Tony points at Rogers like that’s all the proof he needs. “Not a real law. I’ll pay the five, sheriff, because even the law can’t keep him here now.”

Sam looks between them, and now Rogers is standing, significantly more interested in the exchange. To be honest, Sam has no idea if it’s ‘a real law’ or not. It’s not like anyone ever gave him a lawbook - just the commandments, a copy of the Constitution, and his own gut morals. But he’s not about to let Rogers and his new patron swing one over on him.

“Maybe it’s not,” he says slowly, “but he _did_ disturb the peace. Picked a fight, damaged property, and left without paying for his drink.”

“That’s ‘cause you arrested me,” says Rogers.

He narrows his eyes at Tony. “What d’you want him for, anyway?”

“Not your business, sheriff.”

“I think you’ll find it is,” Sam says, and suddenly he’s real defensive, stepping between Tony and the cell. “I’m not lettin’ him out just so you and your shenanigans can land him back in.”

“I can handle myself,” bristles Rogers from behind him. “He’s right, it’s not your business."

"The _law’s_ my business-”

“If we break it, you will be the first to know.” And dammit, Tony’s already got the fiver out in his hand, “Now, sheriff, if you would let my man out, I have a job for him.”

Rollins is watching from his own cell, leaning and the bars and eyeing the money Tony’s got in his hand. “Why don’t you just buy us both out, chief? I’m a real hardworking guy.”

It’s meant to be persuasive, genuine even, and Sam almost can’t blame him - after all, a way out’s staring him in the face and Rogers has only been here since last night. Rollins has been here for near three days. But that doesn’t mean Sam’s got any sympathy for him. He doesn’t think he has a drop of sympathy left in his body.

“I don’t _want_ you, Rollins. I need muscle, not,” Tony says, gesturing to Rogers and then Jack as he tries to find the right word, “- _guns_.”

“Now, hold on,” says Sam, suspicious, “Muscle for what?”

“I need,” Tony clenches his fist in frustration, “ugh, _Inglés_ , I need to- to _convince_ someone. A business deal.”

Sam’s almost certain that the alarm bells sounding in his head are showing on his face. He crosses his arms and leans in a little, grateful for the couple of inches he’s got on Tony. “Now what on Earth you need muscle for? And why can’t you just do it yourself?”

Tony looks offended, and pats himself on the chest as if to reassure Sam. It doesn’t. “ _Me_? I’m just one man. I don’t have the firepower. Now, you, my friend,” he points at Rogers, who’s leaning heavily on the bars of his cell and still towering over them both, “are the size of three men. And now you will owe me. The problem is solved.”

Deep in his gut Sam knows he’s got to put his foot down somehow. He thinks he’s already been pretty final, but here Tony is talking as if Rogers isn’t still behind bars. With a sigh, he looks between the two of them. A rock and a hard place.

He closes his eyes and sends a silent prayer: may Heaven grant me patience because this whole horseshit situation is going to Hell in a handbasket. “Alright,” Sam says, lifting the keys off of his belt. “I’ll let you pay the bail.”

The words have barely left his mouth before a bill is offered to him. Clean, readable, crisp, like it was flown into Tony’s wallet fresh out of some east-coast mint. Sam takes it before he can change his mind, folds it up and stuffs it in his pocket. He feels a little bad for creasing it.

Tony motions to him - _well, go on_ \- and he shoots the Baron a soft glare as he turns to face the cells.

Rogers is standing there right on the other side of the bars as Sam slides the key into the lock. Their faces are just inches apart, and Rogers is staring at him, a little challenging, a little of something else - gratitude? - sparkling in those big blues of his. Sam glares right back, because he’s not about to back down, he’s not the loser here. He’ll still get his way. The lock clicks, but he doesn’t open the door right away.

“One condition,” he says, “Wherever he sends you, I’m coming with. You slip up, you land right back here.”

“Yes, yes, just let him out,” huffs Tony, tapping his foot with all the impatience of a rich man.

“You understand?” Sam’s not talking to Tony. His tone is sharp and he sees Rogers stand a little taller. “No more fightin’.”

“No more fighting,” Rogers nods, his New York drawl surprisingly serious. Sam almost wants to believe him.

He swings the door open and half-expects Rogers to spring out like a man burned, like most of them do when they sense freedom. Instead, Rogers strides out with a straight spine and his head high. He offers a hand to Tony. “I s’pose thanks is in order.”

“<Christ, you’re really a big son of a bitch,>” Tony says, and shakes. He reaches up to pat Rogers’ shoulders as if to determine if they’re _really_ that broad and steps back to eye him from bottom to top. The big blond looks a little uncomfortable with the attention. “ <You got any Spanish? Or no?>”

Rogers hesitates, glancing to Sam like he might offer a translation. When none’s given, he looks between the two of them and says apologetically, “I’ve got a little Irish?”

Tony actually rolls his eyes at Sam and gives him a look that screams _where did you even find this guy_. He says in trilled English, “Oh, good. Helpful. That is what everybody speaks here, so close to Mexico.”

“Anyway,” Rogers clears his throat, a little annoyed already, and Sam does not have a good feeling about the rest of the day. “Thanks. If it’s all the same to you I’d like to get whatever you need done finished as soon as possible so I can be on my way.”

“Samuel,” says Tony, drawing out the name, practically crooning it - Sam feels his shoulders tense up. “My man has effects, doesn’t he?”

The order was only implied, but it still makes Sam’s gut roil. Rogers and Tony wait patiently as he sighs and unlocks the bottom drawer of the desk.

“Coat, hat, wallet,” he hands them over, “-keys. You need to check on some luggage, Mr. Rogers?”

“Just Steve’s fine, Samuel.” Rogers makes a face as he takes them, setting his hat on his head and sliding both arms into his coat and tugging up the collar. There’s a hint of a smirk there, and Sam instantly wants to shove him back in the cell and throw away the key. Tony can have Jack instead. Circuit judge be damned.

“Sheriff, to you,” Sam growls.

“Happy is bringing Just Steve’s things to the boardinghouse,” says Tony with a grin like he’s the funniest man on the face of this Earth. He turns to Rogers and nudges him. “You will have a room waiting for you there when you are finished.”

“Unless you end up back here.” Sam jerks his thumb over his shoulder at the empty cells. “Your rowdy ass can’t seem to stay outta trouble.”

“I’m a model citizen back East, Sheriff,” Rogers says with mock affront. No wonder Natasha likes him so much, he’s got too much snark for even that big body of his. “A war hero, some would say.”

“Alright, alright, Mister Hero, you’ve got your shit, now let’s go,” Sam says as he tries to shepherd them out. Better to get all this business over and done with, anyway.

“Wait, what about me?” Jack calls lazily from his own cell. “You can’t leave me on my own, I might finally make my daring escape.”

Sam is the last to leave, but before he draws the cloth door closed he says, “You sit your ass right there, Rollins, I’ll send Joaquin back around to keep an eye on you.”

Out on the street the sun is beating down in its typical noonday blaze. Sam wipes his face with the bandana hanging at his throat.

“Come,” says Tony, leading them across the little street to the relative shade of the buildings on the other side, “let me tell you about Nick Fury.”

Sam stops walking and Rogers stops with him, unsure. “You’re doing business with _Nick Fury_?”

“I am not, not yet, and that is exactly the problem.” Tony grabs his arm and pulls him into the shade of the general store’s front. Rogers looks between them and opens his mouth, probably to ask the obvious question, but Tony barrels on, “There is a rumor that the railroads are looking south. I need you convince him to sell to me.”

“What, half a hundred miles square isn’t enough for you?”

“He is upriver,” Tony starts ticking off on his fingers. “The ranch is a half day’s ride across, all waterfront-”

“It’s the hot springs, isn’t it?” a voice cuts in from the doorway. “I mean, that’s why all the local riffraff goes to work for him, isn’t it? Because he’s got the hot springs in his part of the Rio.”

“Hey, Foggy,” says Sam.

“Sam,” Foggy nods back, fingers brushing the brim of his hat. He leans on the doorframe like he’s been a part of the conversation all along. Rogers looks between the three of them, clearly aware that he is the odd man out.

“Foggy Nelson.” Sam nods to the man in question. “Runs the general store.”

“Steve Rogers,” The big blond offers a hand to him with a friendly smile.

Foggy chuckles and shakes, “Yeah, I know. Everyone knows who you are. Nice job with Killian.”

“I was a little out of line. I hope he’s okay.”

Sam raises his eyebrows because that concession was just about the last thing he expected out of Rogers’ mouth. It has to be a game of some kind, getting everyone else on his side for the next time he’s itching to fight somebody. Not like many men around here could take him down, after all; the only reason Sam got him all the way to the jail on his own is because he chose to come peacefully. And he has a feeling that’s not because he gives a damn about Al Killian.

There’s a plan here, somewhere in Rogers’ mind, privy only to him. Sam can sense it.

Waving a dismissive hand, Tony rolls his eyes. “Yes, thank you, Nelson.”

He gives Foggy a pointed look. The conversation shuts off then, and there’s a long silence that stretches between the four of them before Foggy picks up on the hint. “Right, then, sorry-” and he stumbles then, not sure what to call Tony, even though he obviously knows who he is since men with clean suits and gold watch chains are hard to mistake around here. “-Uh, sir? Nice meetin’ ya, Steve.”

Rogers nods. “Likewise.”

“See you ‘round, Foggy,” says Sam, as Tony tugs them away again, eager not to be overheard.

“Nice folks around here,” Rogers says, and with a pointed glance at Sam out the corner of his eye, adds, “For the most part.”

If the man himself wasn’t annoying enough, his harsh New York drawl is really starting to grate on Sam’s ears. Sam clears his throat as Tony turns the corner to lead them towards the livery, “Why can’t _you_ go talk to Nick?”

“I have _tried_ ,” Tony grits out, “He does not answer letters or riders, and when I approached him myself I was- I needed to leave.”

Sam has a brief vision of Tony galloping away from the Fury homestead and a loaded twin-barrel shotgun. He wants to grin at the thought, but keeps it to himself.

“So what do you have that he might want?” Rogers asks. So he’s really taking this whole thing seriously. Sam didn’t peg him for the type to make good on promises. 

“Money. I will pay whatever he likes. Unless, of course, you can find another way to convince him-”

“ _No_ ,” Sam says firmly, “This is a negotiation, I won’t be party to any strong-armin’.”

“I’m not gonna threaten anybody unless I have to,” Rogers says, it’s almost reassuring except that ‘unless I have to’ has already gotten one man sent to the doc’s. Sam thinks he could probably put somebody through a wall if he tried, and so he isn’t very convinced even as Rogers looks to Tony. “I know I owe you but this is going to be a conversation. He might say no.”

“Then you make him say yes.” They’re at the livery now, the strong smell of horseshit in the air making both Rogers and Tony wrinkle their noses. A stagecoach with a four-horse team is waiting in front, painted a gaudy red and gold. The driver - Sam thought it might be Happy, but it’s just some kid he doesn’t recognize - hops down and scrambles to open the door and unfold the steps for Tony.

“I will send a man stop to your room tomorrow, Steve. Do not give him the wrong answer,” the Baron says, climbing one step and turning to tower over them. Sam reads the display of wealth as a threat and feels his hackles rise. To him, Tony says, “And don’t you get in his way, Samuel. Or mine.”

He slides inside, the coach door shuts, and with a shout from the kid driver the team gallops away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Historical Notes and Some Backstory that Was Written Out:
> 
> > Sam’s revolver is a shiny new [Colt Open Top](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colt_Model_1871-72_Open_Top), produced 1871-1873. Riley had been using an older model, a [Colt Paterson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colt_Paterson) from the early 1840s, which was quickly eclipsed during the patent wars of the 1850s. It was harder and harder to get ahold of ammunition (the industry had switched from lead balls to pre-packaged “bullets” as we recognize them, thanks to the Civil War), so Riley ordered the new open top for himself before he was killed. It was Natasha who insisted Sam keep it when it arrived.
> 
> > On a similar note : Revolvers are a subcategory of pistol with a revolving barrel that typically holds 4-6 bullets. Most contemporary pistols have their magazines stored in the grip, which allows for a larger capacity. So all revolvers are pistols, but not all pistols are revolvers.
> 
> > “Jasper” later became southwestern slang for “idiot”. True story. 
> 
> > “California collar” = a hangman’s noose
> 
> > Introduced during the Golden Age of Marvel comics, Doctor Donald Blake was originally the man who picked up Mjolnir to transform into Thor - he later became Thor's secret/civilian identity.
> 
> > Tony _is_ the son of Howard Stark (then a humble explorer and surveyor) and a Mexican woman, Maria. He was born in 1829. His mother tried for years to get in contact with Howard and tell him about Tony but he never responded. After the fallout of the Mexican Cession in 1848 a deed was delivered to 'Antonio Stark' naming him the sole owner of 50 square miles (129.5 km square, nearly 32k acres) of New Mexico territory, so he and his mother became very, very rich U.S. citizens. Maria died in comfort in his manor house in 1867 at the age of 64. Tony wrote to Howard to let him know and received no reply.


	3. Ride the High Country

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Per the Baron's mandate, Sam and Rogers go to see Nick Fury.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the chapter where things start to ramp up. There's some backstory, some intrigue, and some subtle hints of foreshadowing (including the title). If there's a detail that seems sudden or strange to mention, it might be worth paying attention to...
> 
> [Discussion of canonical character death in this chapter as well.]
> 
> [Some mood music](https://open.spotify.com/user/mlf9412dgzv4abweyjtxvgs2h/playlist/6yQZ6KUh0n2hmyiaEUowgQ?si=WQSXd-UuS620Hm76AHXgZw).

As luck would have it, certified city-slicker Steve Rogers has never ridden horseback before. He’d gotten swindled to get to Apache Springs - some enterprising soul had charged him near twice the going rate to take him by coach, and so he had assumed it was the normal way to travel out here. When Rogers brings it up as an option to get out to Fury’s Sam laughs so hard that he needs to stop and catch his breath a minute.

Toro Raymond is the young man who runs the small livery, and he gave Rogers a well-broken, well-tempered mare jokingly named Spitfire to borrow for his first time out. Sam’s own stallion nickered cheerfully at him as the horses got saddled up. It was a rather quick process compared to the painfully slow time they’re making now.

Rogers is squirming in the saddle every few yards. It’s confusing Spitfire, sending her every which way, so then Rogers tries to overcompensate to tug her back on track, and she stops because she doesn’t know which way he wants her to go. He huffs, frustrated, so Sam circles back around to him and says so.

“Forward, I just want her to go forward,” he growls.

“So click your tongue and dig your heels in a little, she’ll go.”

He’s giving Sam the stink-eye but he does it. Lo and behold, Spitfire trots forward and tosses her head.

“S’harder than you make it look,” says Rogers as they crest another small hill.

“Spent years of my life on horseback, ‘course it comes easy to me.”

Rogers is quiet for a second, like he’s thinking, and then he says, “You were a cowboy?”

Sam knows what folks out East think of cowboys. Well, he doesn’t _know_ , not exactly, but he’s heard. But it won’t do him much good to pick a fight with Rogers when they’ve still got the rest of the day together, so he settles for, “That a problem?”

“No! No. Just never met one before.”

They ride on in silence for a while. Their part of the territory isn’t desert, not quite, but it’s dry and hot and there’s nothing but cracked earth and some low-growing brush. With the river on their right they ride north over gently rolling hills and watch the whole of the territory spread out before them.

Rogers seems fascinated. There isn’t much to see, but Sam supposes anything this far west’s a novelty for a city boy like him. He keeps craning his neck way and that, taking in the dead little plants and the blur of the horizon in the heat.

“Up on the butte, you can see for miles,” Sam says, gesturing to the rock face on the other side of the Rio. “Too hot right now, but when it’s cooler they say you can see clear to Mexico.”

“Oh yeah?” Rogers whistles, watching the cliff as they amble by. “You ever been? To Mexico?”

Sam’s immediate reaction is to snap at him but he bites his tongue. A deep breath before he trusts himself to speak, and he doesn’t look at Rogers as he says, “Yeah. Then the border crossed us.”

It takes a moment to click. He’s not surprised, he doesn’t expect folks back East to care much about all the borders so long as they can claim the land’s American; the Union doesn’t seem to care so much about the people out here.

“Aw, jeez, I’m sorry,” says Rogers, although there’s not much room next to his foot in his mouth for the apology. “Me and my big trap.”

“Best be careful, or you’ll start catching flies.” There’s only a little malice in Sam’s voice because it’s hard not to forgive the big lout. Rogers laughs. Troublemaker that he is, he doesn’t seem the type to judge a man on account of where he’s from.

The fumble doesn’t seem to stop him long. They’ve barely taken another twenty paces when Rogers says, “So the war with Mexico, the cession, and then what, you ran away to become a cowboy?”

Sam does not feel up to telling his life story, as gentle as the interrogation seems to be. He’s here to keep the peace; befriending this stranger is not on the agenda.

“So, what, you come out to the territories without a lick of Spanish, looking for your kid, who you ain’t been in contact with so you got no idea where he is?” He says it with a little more snide than Rogers did, but the point is there. They don’t have a right to each other’s business.

“He’s, uh, not my kid. He’s - ” Rogers chuckles darkly, is quiet a moment. He watches the vastness stretch out in front of them, maybe searching for the words. Sam really wasn’t expecting the question to be answered, but it’s practically a whisper when Rogers says, “He’s dead.”

The air around them gets heavier, no longer just weighed down with heat but also with grief. Sam can feel it in his bones, knows what it’s like to lose someone close and the hopelessness you feel when the world keeps spinning without them. It’s a recent hurt: the set of Roger’s jaw gives away the rawness.

Sam doesn’t really know what to say. When Riley was murdered, he’d had to step up immediately - question witnesses (there weren’t any), catch the criminal (no witnesses, no leads - whichever bastard did it’s still at large today), reassure the town that he could do what the job required of him (the only thing Sam had any control over at that point). He hadn’t gotten a chance to mourn until he’d drowned his sorrows, let it out, packed it back in, and buried it down deep, all after Riley’d already been in the ground near a week. He hasn’t touched the drink or the grief since.

“Tell me about him,” he says, because that’s what Natasha’d said to him five months ago.

Rogers’ eyes slide over to him quick. He keeps his mouth shut, but the sharpness in his look makes Sam feel like he’s a bull being appraised at the station. After a second, he understands that Rogers is trying to decide if he’s trustworthy or not. Rogers _wants_ to talk about it, he can see that shining under the surface like gold.

Sam tries again: “How did you know him?”

There’s another long silence. Steve chews over his words.

“We served together,” he says finally. His voice is deep and soft, like he thinks he’ll be overheard, but the land here knows how to keep secrets. There’s a soft, fond smile on his face. “Bucky, he uh, he shot me. That’s how we met.”

“Holy _Christ_.”

“Well, he was a Rebel at first, and a sharpshooter.” Rogers is chuckling now, and it’s infectious. Sam finds himself smiling without thinking. “Good, too. Said he was near 900 yards out when he got me.”

Sam whistles, “ _Jesus_.”

“I damn near died when I heard. I mean, I was also, you know, bleedin’.” He gestures to his whole torso. “But the kid felt so bad he defected immediately and ran to catch up to my unit to get me help. Saved my life.”

“He’s also the one who shot you, though.”

“Well, yeah,” Steve shakes his head, “But I don’t blame him. He’s just a kid.” He pauses for a moment, “Jesus, he- he would’ve. He would’ve been twenty-three.”

Sam thinks back to being twenty-three, being out on open land with nothing but a young colt to his name and a blanket for a saddle. He’d had his whole future ahead of him: he couldn’t imagine risking that every day on a bloody eastern battlefield fighting a war between brothers.

“I heard a lot of kids lie on their papers,” Sam says, and immediately shuts his mouth because he knows it’s the wrong thing. Even if Barnes would’ve been close to thirty now, Steve doesn’t need any more guilt heaped on to what he’s already wearing on his sleeve.

“No, uh, in March. Woulda been twenty-three in March.” Rogers takes a deep breath and the tenseness creeps back into his jaw. “He was sixteen at Wilderness.”

“Jesus.” Sam says, because there’s nothing else to say. He tries to imagine dying at twenty-three. Back then, he would’ve been just another dead cowboy, but here he is instead, six years later, lawman of a small but thriving town. Without even knowing Barnes, his heart hurts for him.

“Yeah.” Spitfire’s wandered a little far to the left in search of grass, and Steve oversteers to try and bring her back to heel beside Sam. He comes a little too close. Their knees brush until the horses find a comfortable distance away from each other.

“His family got a letter, about a week ago,” says Steve after a while. “Killed in action.”

“So you came out here . . .?” Sam’s not sure how he wants to finish the question. Rogers seems like an “ask questions later” kind of man.

“I don’t know. Thought maybe I could . . . see his body. Or something. Make it real. But I don’t have much pull in the army anymore.”

Sam remembers Riley’s body, laid out on the table in what was Doctor Banner’s office at the time. He was pale in death, and that was what had struck Sam more than the smell or the stillness of him: all the color drained out of his skin like he’d never spent a day in the sun in his life.

He doesn’t know what comfort he can offer so instead he says, “That’s it, right there.”

Like always, the smell of shit hits him first. You can always smell a herd before you see it, especially out here. All the buildings on the Fury ranch spill from the haze in the distance, at about five hundred yards. There are three: the little farmhouse, a large storage shed, and the barn that dominates the horizon. It’s made of wood, a rarity out here, and a stark contrast against the smooth adobe mud of the other structures. Sam reckons there are stalls for about two dozen horses and room for their riders in the loft. They’re coming up on the fence that encircles the near side of the barn.

What must be a couple hundred head of cattle are lazing in the sparse grass, some clustered together in the meager shadow of the barn to escape the heat. There must be more wandering beyond where Sam can see. It’s not like Fury to run his operation at anything less than optimum capacity. Only two men watch over the cattle, one on horseback and the other perched on a fencepost.

Sam doesn’t recognize either of them. It makes him nervous. But he touches the brim of his hat and nods as he passes by. Rogers echoes him. The smell of cowshit fills his nose.

On the porch of the farmhouse is a bald man with an eyepatch, sitting in a rocking chair. Rogers glances between him and Sam, unsure.

“Sheriff,” says Nick Fury. “About damn time.”

“Hey, Nick.” Sam hops down to shake the man’s hand. Nick is looking pointedly at Rogers, who’s got his wrong foot in the stirrup and swings his leg wide to come down facing the wrong way. He turns around and gathers Spitfire’s reins in his hand.

“Steve Rogers.” he says, and offers his hand to Nick as well before turning to Sam and gesturing with the reins. “Where can I, uh?”

“I got her.” Sam takes the reins and leads Spitfire over to a post. His own stallion, Lee, is watching him, ears pointed back in jealousy as he hitches her up. “<You’re good, right?>”

That gets him a soft nicker in response. He chuckles.

Nick shakes Steve’s hand without making a move to get up from his chair. “You a deputy?”

“Ah, no.” says Rogers, straightening his spine like he’s back in the Army. “I’m just helping out. Here to talk.”

“About what?” Sam clears his throat and they both look at him. “Maybe we can get out of the heat?”

Fury’s eyes - _eye_ , singular - narrows. He takes the hint, standing with a nod and gesturing for them both to follow him inside. Sam can feel the cowhands’ eyes on his back as he goes. With a swish the cloth door closes behind him.

“And what did you want to talk about, Sheriff?” Fury’s tone is clipped but he’s standing casually, leaned up against his kitchen table, pouring some tobacco out into creased cigarette paper.

Steve looks between them and crosses his arms. “Actually, Mr. Fury, I’d like to-”

“Nick’s fine. And I was talking to him.” Fury finishes rolling and uses the cigarette to gesture to Sam, eyes never leaving his face. The rancher is one of the furthest things from a lawman in this town, but he can’t help but feel judged under that gaze.

“Rogers’ got a proposition for you, Nick.” Sam shoves his hands in his pockets. He’s suddenly aware of the weight of his pistol on his hip. “I’m just here to play bodyguard.”

Fury scoffs out something resembling a laugh. “Any son of a bitch that size don’t need a bodyguard.” He pulls a matchbox out of his pants pocket and strikes one against the side; the flame is small, but its sudden brightness in the darker interior of the house draws Sam’s eyes. Nick lights his cigarette and pinches the head of the match to snub it.

“ _Nick_.” It’s a forceful tone of voice coming out of Rogers’ mouth, and Sam knows he’s already decided not to like Fury. “I’m here to-”

“You’re here to talk me into selling the ranch, ain’t you? And the good sheriff’s here to stop you from starting any more fights. It’s not hard to put together, Steve.”

Rogers doesn’t exactly know what to say to that, Sam knows him well enough now to read the surprise in the way he works his jaw. Sam can only hope that Nick can’t read his tells as well as he can read the situation.

When he’d first met Nick Fury, he was similarly caught off guard by the rancher’s sharp eye and uncanny way of knowing things. Riley had been there then to introduce them proper. Nick Fury had liked Riley, had been among the most vocal about tracking down the murderer.

Then Sam had come back empty-handed, and now he avoids the ranch.

“Should’ve blown Antonio’s head off when I had the chance.”

He says it so casually that Sam’s guts start to twist into ice. “C’mon, Nick, you know I can’t abide that kind of talk.”

Fury looks to Steve, that same sharp gaze that focuses on you like you’re the only man in the room and strips you bare. “Alright, let’s have your proposition then.”

Rogers hooks his thumbs on his belt buckle and tips his head up so he’s looking down his nose at Nick. “Tony’s prepared to pay whatever it takes.”

“I think my price might be a little high, even for him.” The rancher says. “But you two, I think, could handle it.”

“What?” Steve glances at Sam like he knows what the man’s talking about. Sam shrugs and shakes his head.

“I’ve got a little problem of my own. And since you two are already running around doing errands, you seem like you could help me out.”

That makes them both bristle, and Sam swears he can see Steve square up his shoulders to stand another inch taller. Rogers has got at least twenty pounds and three inches on either him or Nick, but with the casual dominance in the way Fury’s standing it’s very clear who’s really steering the conversation.

“You saw the herd on your way in, I take it?” Fury doesn’t wait for a response,. “Near five hundred head. Three days ago, it was double that.”

“Cow thieves.” says Steve. He’s got a look on his face like he doesn’t quite believe the story.

“My own men.” Nick growls low in his throat.

“And how come you didn’t come to me?” Sam tilts his head. A warm, wet suspicion sinks its hooks into his stomach.

“I sent Sitwell to find you.” Something in Fury’s tone is almost accusatory, which Sam takes great objection to, but a surprisingly level-headed Steve Rogers steps between them.

“He was shot. By Jack Rollins.” Steve says, “Another one of yours?”

Fury nods. His upper lip is twitching. He takes a drag of his cigarette.

Sam quietly taps the tin star on his belt, traces the letters with his trigger finger. “Sitwell’ll live. Rollins is waiting for a judge to come in on the next train.”

“Jack ran with the men who stole half my herd. Called themselves the Skeleton Crew.”

“You take outlaws in often?” says Steve.

“All the time,” Fury answers. “You’d be surprised who’s willing to do honest work for an honest price around here, Rogers.”

Steve takes a step closer, temper simmering just below the vein throbbing in his temple. Nick does as well - they’re so close that their chests would touch if either man took too deep a breath. Sam suddenly gets the feeling that the fight with Killian won’t be the last one Rogers starts in this town.

“When Sitwell didn’t come back I sent another one of my own after them. That was day before last.”

“Another criminal?” Sam snaps.

“He was, once.” says Fury, “Been on the straight a while. But they’ll have got wherever they’re going by now and I need to know where that is. If I can’t get my herd back, I at least want my money.”

Sam and Steve share a look. He doesn’t know if Rogers has any conception of value out here, what with his willingness to pay a five-dollar bail, but losing this big a herd is not something to be taken lightly. Sam runs the numbers a moment - roughly twenty-five dollars a head at five hundred cows. That’s more money than Sam’s ever seen in his life. Probably more than even the Baron could afford to lose.

Nick takes another drag. “I’ll tell you what. You two catch up to him, find out what he knows. Better yet - catch up to the thieves themselves. Once I know this problem’s fixed, then I might even consider selling.”

“What, you don’t have enough lackeys to run around hell and half the territory for you anymore?” Steve says, a little snide.

“No. I don’t.” Fury stamps the butt of the cigarette out in a little brass ashtray. “Those two out there are the only ones I’ve got left.”

Sam scoffs. “I don’t know if you know this, Nick, but I’ve got better things to do-”

“Like what, sheriff? How about you do your job, and for maybe once in your career you catch a goddamned lawbreaker?”

That sends Sam’s nerves alight in an angry kind of flame. Of all men, Nick Fury has no _fucking_ right to lecture him. His fist clenches tight around the star on his belt.

There’s a large hand on his arm, right near his elbow, and distantly he hears Rogers grit out, “We’ll think about it, Nick. Thanks for the hospitality. Sheriff?”

The hand is tugging him towards the door. He follows and turns his back on that bastard, son of a bitch rancher.

Spitfire’s waiting loyally outside where she’s still looped to the post. Her ears are straight up and forward, and she nickers happily when Rogers comes closer to unhitch her.

“Lee!” Sam whistles and calls for his own sorrel stallion, “Łitugaa!”

Said stallion comes galloping around from the shady side of the house. He snorts, headbutting Sam in the chest once he gets close enough. Sam chuckles, but it’s a small thing with Fury’s words still ringing in his head.

“Is that his full name?” Steve asks. He’s not sure if it’s more out of curiosity or an eagerness to change the subject. “Say it again.”

“Łitugaa.” Sam scratches the big lug behind both his ears and rubs the sides of his face. “It’s Mescalero.”

“What’s it mean?” Rogers grunts as he tries to pull himself into Spitfire’s saddle. She sidesteps, and the saddle slips a little under his weight. With a soft grunt he hops back to the ground.

He plants his own foot in the stirrup and slides into his own saddle without a problem. “There’s not really a straightforward translation. It’s ‘red bird’ or ‘red feather’, something like that. Red is ‘łitu’, that’s all I know for sure.”

“Still pretty neat.” Steve echoes him, left foot in the stirrup and stepping up to swing his leg over. He has a small proud smile on his face as he takes the reins.

Sam clicks his tongue and uses his knees to guide Łitugaa in the right direction. Spitfire turns and shadows them, more from knowing to follow rather than from any actual direction from Rogers. The two cowhands watch them closely as they ride out.

“He was an express rider,” Sam says to Steve after while, once they’re far out of earshot and back on open land, “Fury. Lost his eye to bandits, and lost his job when the whole operation went under.”

“So he’s bitter.” Steve shrugs, “Doesn’t give him a right to say the things he did.”

Deep down, Sam knows he’s right. But he also knows those words were meant to barb him and they did - he can feel the accusations sticking to his ribs.

Rogers nudges Spitfire a little so they’re riding side-by-side again. “I can go after Fury’s man. You’re not beholden to Tony the way I am, anyway. And you have a job to do.”

There’s a little blossom in Sam’s chest when Steve speaks, like he knows he can trust Steve to handle himself on a manhunt. The man’s not an idiot - he’s former Army, and he’s mostly picked up riding just by watching Sam for a couple of hours. But he doesn’t know New Mexico like Sam does, doesn’t speak any Spanish, and most importantly is not a peace officer like Sam is. He’s got no authority, no matter how much he acts like it.

“You’re right,” he says, and squares his shoulders. The little tin star on his belt catches the light. “Better go do my job, then.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look out, lots of notes this time around:
> 
> > [Toro Raymond](http://marvel.wikia.com/wiki/Thomas_Raymond_\(Earth-616\)) was a member of the Invaders, Cap's original comic book team.
> 
> > Spitfire was the superhero persona of [Jacqueline Falsworth](http://marvel.wikia.com/wiki/Jacqueline_Falsworth_\(Earth-616\)), another Invader.
> 
> > Spitfire-the-horse is a buckskin (light brown) Morgan. She looks like [this](https://img.equinenow.com/slir/w1200/equine/data/photos/1188597/1516289723/buckskin-amha-horse.jpg).
> 
> > Łitugaa/Lee is a chestnut (reddish-brown) Mustang with a white star. He looks like [this](https://c8.alamy.com/comp/CX7291/chestnut-horse-with-white-star-and-4-white-socks-grazes-in-the-field-CX7291.jpg).
> 
> > Related: Łitugaa's name is not a real Mescalero word, but the combination of two - Łitu (red) and gaan (eagle). I have no idea if it's a valid name, but I was prepared to do linguistic backflips in order to name him accordingly. The sound "Ł" doesn't really exist in English, but you could get close if you try to pronounce the "breathy l" like in "clue" or if you press your tongue to the top of your mouth and force an "h" sound through. LHEE-too-ga.
> 
> > People in the Old West (and the... Old East?) did not have a very high opinion of cowboys. They were looked down upon, lower than "blue collar" and "the help" because their job was dirty with long lonely hours and no one wanted it. The redemption of cowboys came with the popularity of western films in the early 20th century.
> 
> > "the border crossed us": Sam was born in 1842, in what was then Mexico. During the Mexican Cession in 1848, when hundreds of thousands of square miles was ceded to the United States, people living on that land could either abandon it and move past the new Mexican border, or stay and work towards becoming U.S. citizens. Because of how they were treated during the Mexican-American War, Sam's parents elected to stay Mexican and moved further south. Sam never liked that decision, so in the mid 1850s he left home and moved back up north, to what was now the New Mexico territory.
> 
> > Bucky making a shot from 900 yards: Confederate [Whitworth rifles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitworth_rifle) had an effective range of 800-1000 yards and, when equipped with a scope, is considered by some to be the world's first sniper rifle.
> 
> > The [Battle of Wilderness](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Wilderness), where Steve and Bucky met, was fought in Virginia in 1864. Bucky was 16 at the time, but as an orphan with nowhere else to go he'd lied about his age. Steve was 23 and had just been given his first command.
> 
> > I imagine the look on Steve's face when he says "Cow thieves" to be very similar to when he says "Aliens. From outer space." in Avengers.
> 
> > 500 cows x $25 a head = $12,500. That's almost $250,000 today, which is nothing to sneeze at.
> 
> > The [Pony Express](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pony_Express), despite its legendary place in American history, was actually a failed enterprise that only lasted 18 months. It's another element of the Old West that was popularized in the early 20th century.


	4. The Searchers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The boys go to Albuquerque.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things are starting to ramp up. There's some minor geographic talk so a map may be helpful for some, but there's enough discussion in the story that an intimate knowledge of New Mexico is not necessary.

With Fury’s man nearly two full days ahead of them, Sam has no guesses as to how long he and Steve will be gone. With no deputy, he recruits Apache Springs’ only doctor to keep an eye on things. Don Blake is a large, charismatic man — bigger even than Steve — with a large heart and a sense of right and wrong that reminds Sam of Riley. Sitwell is on the mend, and with no other patients Blake can easily run his practice from the little town jail.

Sam bribes Joaquin to check in on the little hut he calls home. Steve spent the night at the boardinghouse, but moved his case to Sam’s in order to avoid running up a charge in his absence. Everything of Sam’s own that’s valuable — his gun, his badge, his horse — will be with him, but he’d already bought the candies and it’s better that the kid had something to occupy his time rather than sniffing out trouble.

On their way to the livery, they stop at the general store for supplies. Hard tack, bacon, and maize — stuff that’ll keep in the heat. Steve nearly gives Foggy a heart attack when he offers to buy the Sharps rifle mounted behind the counter.

“You’re taking this pretty seriously,” Sam chides as Foggy counts out ammunition.

Steve chuckles and checks over the trigger. “Might as well come prepared and do it right the first time.” When he’s satisfied he pulls out his wallet but hesitates. “How’d you get your hands on an Army-issue carbine?”

“Same as you, slick. I bought it.” Nelson laughs and says nothing more. Steve counts out the money with a chuckle.

“Are you Steve Rogers? I don’t know your voice.”

Sam looks over his shoulder to see the telegraph operator leaning against a shelf. He feels more than sees Steve bristle a little beside him. 

“Who wants to know?” says Steve, finger on the trigger guard even though the rifle isn’t loaded.

“Matt Murdock,” the operator says, stepping forward and offering his right hand. He’s got a cane in his left, and a thin piece of red cotton tied over his eyes. “I’ve got a telegram from New York for you, Steve.”

Steve shakes his hand and shoots Sam a suspicious look out the corner of his eye. “No one in New York knows I’m here. Not here, specifically. They know I made it to New Mexico.”

“Well, unless there’s a different Steve Rogers in town,” says Murdock, digging the folded card out of his pocket. “It got bounced around a little bit, but Foggy told me you stopped by yesterday.”

Sam watches Steve take the card and flip it open, sees the moment when his jaw tenses as he reads. He prompts, “What’s it say?”

Steve says nothing, so Murdock tries, “Anything important?” Even though he knows full well what it says.

“It’s nothing,” Steve finally says . He gathers the ammo off the counter and slips it into a pouch on his belt that Sam’s lending him. “You ready to go?”

“Yeah.” Sam nods. If Steve wants to drop it, he’ll drop it. “Yeah. You got everything?”

“Good luck out there,” says Foggy.

Murdock smiles warmly in their direction. “Pleasure to meet you, Steve.”

“Pleasure’s all mine.” Steve says it so fast it’s got to be a reflex. “See you both around.”

With that, he’s out the door. Sam tips his hat to Nelson and claps Murdock on the shoulder as he follows.

It’s still early morning so it’s relatively cool on the street, but it’s still New Mexico in June so neither of them has got anything heavier on than their cotton shirts. They’ve each got their saddlebags, loaded with supplies; Steve’s got the Sharps resting against his shoulder with his hand under the stock like he’s about to start marching with it. Habit, Sam supposes.

Once they get closer to the livery Steve hands him the folded telegram card without a word.

“I don’t need to know, y’know,” Sam says, but Steve presses it into his hand anyway.

“It’s from his sister.”

It takes Sam a moment to place who ‘he’ is. “Barnes’?”

Steve nods. Sam flips the card open. It’s addressed to S. G. ROGERS, NEW MEXICO:

Steve — come back home — will wire for return train just ask  
— dont lose yourself following him — Becca

Sam’s heart sinks into his stomach. “Y’know, you don’t have to-”

“Don’t.”

He presses on anyway, “You’re not beholden to anyone out here, Steve. Folks back home sound like they miss you pretty fierce.”

Steve is quiet for a few long moments, but takes the card back when it’s offered and tucks it into his pants pocket. “I gave my word that I’d help out here. I don’t go back on things like that.”

Then Steve’s eyes lock onto his, and Sam is so near blindsided by the sincerity in his voice that he doesn’t get annoyed or even notice the _woird_ or _heah_ or _tings_ that mark Steve so clearly as a city slicker. He made a promise, and he means to see it through. Sam can respect that.

They make it to the livery. Toro is waiting for them with the horses and a grin. He hands Spitfire’s reins to Steve and says, “Keep her fed and watered, Rogers, unless you’d like to see her temper.”

“Wouldn’t want that,” says Steve, with a grin that doesn’t reach his eyes.

“How long you reckon you’ll be gone, sheriff?” Toro asks, helping Steve hitch his saddlebags. “I could come with you, lend a hand, Mariner’s saddled up and Monty’s agreed to watch the stables—”

Sam shakes his head. “It won’t be more’n a few days.”

Lee’s busied himself sniffing out the maize Sam thought he buried under a blanket in his bag. With a laugh, Toro offers the stallion’s reins to Sam. “Just tryna help.”

“Stop asking for trouble, Toro, it’ll come to you one way or another.” He musses the kid’s black hair, even though Toro has sprouted to damn near his own height. The young man pushes him away with a grin.

Steve does the smart thing and uses the mounting block to step into the saddle. He’s a tall man, but Spitfire’s not a tall horse, and it always takes at least few weeks for men new to riding to adjust completely. Sam expects Steve will have it down pat in the next couple of days. He’s watching Toro closely, the young man holding Lee and Spitfire’s bridles and clicking his tongue at them to keep their attention as Sam mounts up. Toro catches him looking.

“What’s that look for?”

Sam sees Steve’s gaze turn soft and slide far away for a moment before coming back into focus on the here and the now. Half of Steve’s mouth lifts into a weak smile. “You just remind me of somebody.”

“Handsome devil, I hope.” Toro lets go of the bridles. Lee, now that he’s caught the scent, tries to turn his head and hunt through the saddlebags.

“Something like that.”

“You take good care of the sheriff.”

“What’s this, you don’t think I can handle myself all a’sudden?” Sam chuckles, trying to lend a little light and draw Steve back away from his own thoughts.

“I know you can, but he’s got the bigger gun.” Toro laughs. “Good luck.”

“Keep an eye on the place, Toro.” Sam turns the horse with his knees to face open land, “We’ll be back before you know it.”

He whistles, but it’s unnecessary since he and his horse have been together so long. Lee knows to go — he tosses his head and makes his way out of town. Spitfire follows behind.

Steve is quiet a long time, rocking forward and back with his horse’s paces. The rifle bobs up and down on his back. It’s three days to get where they’re going, so Sam isn’t necessarily eager to rush into conversation, but it’s the looseness in Steve’s spine that bothers him. For a while he guides them back north in silence.

After an hour, he gets sick of the moping and taps Steve’s calf with his boot, “”Hey. Steve. You with me?”

That seems to snap Rogers back into himself. He glances around, but it’s not like the scenery changes much or very quickly. They’ve only just begun skirting around Fury’s ranch, sticking close to the river.

“North?” says Steve. “Not El Paso?”

“No railroads in El Paso,” Sam says casually, like he hadn’t been up most the night before staring at the ceiling thinking this through. “Westbound runs through Albuquerque about once a week.”

Steve sounds doubtful. “I don’t really think that our thieves are gonna try and load five hundred cows into train cars.”

“Can you imagine the bill for those tickets?” snorts Sam, and it’s an ugly laugh, a real laugh that has tension and worry bleeding out of his shoulders. It wrings an amused chuckle from Steve, which only makes Sam laugh more, because he’s hilarious. Once he’s calmed down a little he clarifies, “No, _we’re_ going to catch the train. Head them off at Gallup, before they make it to Arizona.”

“I thought we were going after Fury’s man?”

“Better to catch the whole herd,” says Sam. “Easier, too. They would’ve stopped off for supplies, fresh horses, more hands before driving west.”

“And you know this because?” Steve answers his own question with a nod. “Cowboy, right.”

”Damn near ten years of my life weren’t for nothing.”

“Alright there, sheriff, don’t get too big a head.” Steve’s laugh is deep in his chest and it makes Sam smile. “We’ve still got a ways to go.”

“Might as well start calling me Sam.” He throws him a grin, tipping his hat like he’s just introducing himself for the first time. “How d’you do?”

“Sam,” says Steve with a soft chuckle, nodding back. There’s a real grin on his face, ten times brighter than the pained half-smile he’d given Toro. “Now why don’t you read a poor city slicker in on this grand plan of yours?”

Albuquerque is nearly one hundred fifty miles, but they make it in three days. The desert gets cold enough at night that Sam and Steve learn quick to sleep against one another with a horse on either side to block most of the chill. When they’re washing up in the river, Steve is wringing out his blue cotton shirt and Sam learns about the white, puckered scar on his right flank — probably where Barnes’d shot him. He sees a little of what Tony had been admiring, the muscles in Steve’s shoulders and back, but it’s the scar that his eyes keep going back to. Sam thinks about how quick Steve must’ve been to forgive a kid who’d only been doing what he was told, how quick he’d been to stand up to cards cheaters and bitter old ranchers. How folks back east had asked him back but here he was, chasing cattle thieves to the ass-end of nowhere with a sheriff who’d been nothing but bitter towards him since he’d arrived, all because he’d given his word.

But Steve trusts him, and his plan to drive the whole herd all the way back to Apache Springs rather than going after the easy target of one man. Sam doesn’t know what he did to earn this kind of trust. He knows he likes having someone like Steve at his back.

He teaches Steve the ropes of cattle driving and long-haul riding as they go. Tells him about his own first drives, best as he can remember. They’re pushing the horses hard, seven or eight hours in the morning and then another six after lunch. Lee is used to it after the years on cattle trails, but Spitfire has only ever been a training horse and Steve is a big man. He’s got good posture from the Army, but it’s easy to slouch in the saddle and Sam has to remind him a few times to sit up and carry some of his own weight so she doesn’t tire out too quick. Steve winces like he feels bad about his size and offers to walk instead.

“Then you’ll just slow us down more,” Sam chides, but he grins because he doesn’t really mean it. Steve smiles back and they ride on.

They make it to Albuquerque right as the sun’s going down on the third day. The first thing they do is head to the train station, where there’s a large wooden board with a train table posted.

Sam takes one look at the board and breathes a sigh of relief. The next westbound train is slated to leave tomorrow morning at 8:49.

Steve lets out a low whistle. “We just got so lucky, Sam.”

“I am sleeping in a _bed_ tonight.” He hops off Lee and the stallion gives him a grateful nudge. Steve follows suit, Spitfire making a tired little noise after he hits the ground.

“Thought you were well-suited for trail life.”

“You shut your mouth, Rogers.” Sam glances at him, then back at the board once more to memorize the time. 8:49. They’ve got all night. He’s going to sleep so well. “Even us rough-and-tumble folk can appreciate the finer things.”

“I bet you can.” There’s something amused in Steve’s voice that Sam can’t quite identify, but it doesn’t matter. They find a stable and pay to board the horses for the night. After they brush them down, Sam shows Steve how to carry his saddle and watches him take the weight with the saddlebags still attached like it’s nothing. They share a drink that night — sarsaparilla, both of them, and Steve isn’t prepared for the taste so he makes a face and Sam near spits out his drink in laughter — and bunk down early.

After three days under open sky, the night is noisy and warm and Sam can laze all the way across a bed of his own like a cat. He scrubs up, washing the dirt of the trail off his face and hands, off the back of his neck, and lays face first on the covers. He’s asleep in moments.

The next morning he wakes up when Steve swats him on the arm with a hand towel. He gets him back, though — dripping water from the wash basin down the back of Steve’s neck as he’s leaning down to pull on his boots. They make their way out of the boardinghouse shoving each other and laughing like boys. Steve almost gets a faceful of wooden post; Sam loses it and cackles so hard he near loses his balance.

He’s still wheezing as he fumbles with the straps on Lee’s saddle. Out of the corner of his eye he sees Steve sneak Spitfire a handful of maize and press a finger to his lips. She’s too busy slobbering all over his hand to notice, but Sam watches him give her a fond smile and scratch between her eyes. Lee nudges Sam’s shoulder and gives him an expectant look.

“<I don't have anything.>” Sam says, and the horse blinks at him. He concedes, “<Alright, maybe later.>"

That seems to satisfy the beast. He whinnies and tosses his head, eager to go. Spitfire joins in and it makes both Sam and Steve laugh.

It’s half past eight when they make it back to the station. The train is already there, the iron monstrosity looming above them, the smokestack blotting out the early morning sun. There’s a couple passenger cars and an open-top flatbed with stalls and hitches for horses.

Two tickets to Gallup costs less than Steve’s bail had been. Sam is unceremoniously shoved aside while Steve pays. The horses seem nervous about climbing the ramp onto the platform and back away when Sam tries to walk them closer to get them used to it.

Steve walks over with the tickets in hand. “Day trips are seat yourself, it seems.”

Sam grimaces reflexively at the New Yawk _yoahself_ and ignores the long-suffering look Steve gives him. “Come on, help me with these stubborn cows.”

“Not if you call them that.” Steve takes Spitfire’s reins and rubs her nose. Her tail flicks happily. “My best girl deserves better than that kind of talk.”

“Your best girl is a rented lady.” Sam rolls his eyes at the offended scoff from Steve. “Maybe once you grow up, you’ll get a horse of your very own.”

He takes two backwards steps up the ramp, but Lee tugs his reins and pulls him back down onto the dirt. “<I swear, I will leave you here. Stubborn ass.>" 

Lee plants his front hooves and headbutts Sam in the stomach.

“You two were made for each other,” says Steve. “Here, hold these.”

It’s Spitfire’s reins. Sam doesn’t know what kind of nonsense Steve’s got in mind, but he’s got his satchel over his shoulder as he climbs the ramp. He’s already got Spitfire’s full attention; Lee looks doubtful but his ears are straight up and forward, curious.

“I’ve got this,” Steve says, digging around and producing a bright red apple. He takes a bite into it and the sharp _crunch_ has every horse in the place looking in his direction. “I might have another one to share.” 

Lee goes first, not so much bravery as gluttony, and Spitfire loyally follows. The horses crowd Steve at the top of the wide ramp, nudging him this way and that as he carves off small slices of apple for them with his eating knife until the whole thing is gone. He’s chuckling as he grabs ahold of their reins for Sam to make his way to the top.

“None for me?” Sam jokes, backing Lee into an empty stall and murmuring to him in soft Spanish.

“Sorry, stubborn cows only.” Steve gives him a cheeky grin. He follows Sam’s lead and uses his size to back Spitfire into her own stall. “There you go, girl. Not so bad, was it?”

She nickers at him, showing her teeth before nosing around in his satchel — no doubt in search of the second apple he promised.

“It’ll only be a few hours to Gallup. If we keep an eye out we might even see them as we pass by,” says Sam, as he hitches Lee’s reins around the post. “They’d be smart to stay out of sight of the railroad, but Fury didn’t say they were smart.”

“What makes you so sure they’d come north?” Steve asks, and it’s gentle, curious, not meant to be insulting.

“Less bandits up north,” Sam answers instantly. “Just because the war with Mexico’s long over doesn’t mean the fighting is. More forests too, grasslands. If you drive cattle over too sparse of ground they lose too much weight by the time you hit Los Angeles.”

“You think they’re gonna drive them out to California?”

He nods. If he were driving with a thirteen-thousand-dollar herd he’d just stolen from the angriest man on the face of this Earth, he’d try his damnedest to get as far away as possible, “It’s what I’d do. They might try to sell the herd off at Flagstaff, but we’ll have caught ‘em by then.”

“Yeah.” Steve nods, and claps him on the back. Sam staggers forward a step with the force. “We’ll catch ‘em.”

“Damn right.”

“Yeah.”

The whistle rings from the engine, loud and reverberating, and it makes Sam want to cover his ears. Lee stamps fitfully and tosses his weight like he wants to get away but doesn’t know how. Spitfire flattens her ears back. The conductor shouts “Last call” from the back of one of the passenger cars.

“Shall we?” Steve says, gesturing to the car behind the horse pallet. There are large windows cut for air in the sides and front, so they’ll be able to keep an eye on the horses while staying in the shade. Sam opens the door and slides into the first row of benches. Steve sits beside him and takes his hat off, fanning himself. “Long day.”

“It ain’t even nine.”

Sam watches another passenger ride his horse up the ramp and right into a stall without a problem. To be honest, it’s the horse — a limber pinto with a badger face and one eye — that catches his attention first, because there’s a lot going on all at once there. The man himself is rather unremarkable except for the bow slung across his back and the quiver on his hip, but those aren’t exactly rare weapons in these parts of the world. Sam himself carried a bow and arrow for a long time on the trail before he saved up to enough buy a reliable rifle. He hadn’t been much good at it.

The whistle sounds again, and the conductor calls, “All aboard.” The wide ramp onto the horse platform is lifted and secured to posts at either end, on its side like a makeshift fence. Even from back here Sam can hear the gargantuan engine firing up. Steve watches him with something like concern on his face.

“What?”

“You ever ridden a train before?” says Steve quietly.

“Yeah, couple times.” Once. Sam didn’t remember it being this _loud_.

Steve nods and leans back in his seat, making a show like he’s not watching him out of the corner of his eye. Sam watches the rider out on the platform slide off his horse just as the train jolts into slow motion.

“If you start to feel sick, just don’t look outside,” Steve offers.

Sam barely hears him, because the rider’s stepped out from behind his horse. He takes his hat off his head to fan himself. He’s sandy-haired with a plain face and a bent nose and Sam _knows_ that face; he’s seen it around the cards table and the boardinghouse bar enough times back in Apache Springs. There’s only one reason a man like that might cut out of town as fast as he can.

He cusses so hard that Steve’s eyebrows shoot up into his hair. “That’s Clint Barton.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> > Sam's "house" would've most likely been a one-room structure built of adobe mud. He'd probably have a bed, a table, a trunk of some kind, and maybe a stove to cook with.
> 
> > Maize is another, more time-period-appropriate word for corn. Sam and Steve bought several pounds of dried kernels to help feed the horses because of the high sugar content. They also might've popped it for themselves over a campfire - a trick that the United States learned from Native tribes across the country.
> 
> > The [Sharps carbine rifle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharps_rifle#Sharps_military_carbine) that Steve buys was a common gun among U.S. Army Calvary units. Chances are a rogue soldier or deserter sold it to Foggy because he needed the money.
> 
> > For those who don't know, Matt Murdock is Daredevil. He's probably the fastest telegraph operator in the West, let's be honest with ourselves.
> 
> > Rebecca Barnes, depending on where you look, is either Bucky's fanon sister (MCU, if I remember correctly Bucky's siblings are never actually established beyond him being the eldest of four) or a female version of Bucky nicknamed Rikki (616/Onslaught Reborn arc). In this AU, she is Bucky's sister that he found in NYC after the Civil War.
> 
> > Toro's horse Mariner is a reference to Namor the Sub Mariner, yet another Invader and my favorite salty Atlantean.
> 
> > You may recognize Monty's name from the MCU's Howling Commandos, but Sir Montgomery Falsworth was also the comics' first Union Jack during WWI and later donned the costume again to join his daughter (Spitfire) as an Invader.
> 
> > Riding is a learned skill and is very very difficult on your core muscles when you first start out. It's super easy to slouch, which Steve does even in the great shape he's in. Related: Sam has abs of steel because of this.
> 
> > Driving cattle in the American Southwest was very tricky because of all the sparse ground. You couldn't drive your herd too fast because they wouldn't weigh enough to be valuable at the end of the drive, and you couldn't drive too slow unless you and your fellow cowboys would like to run out of supplies and tire your horses out before you made it to the next town.
> 
> > During the rise of the railroads, people were notoriously suspicious of traveling on them and often got sick because they were not used to such high speeds - around 40mph (64kph).
> 
> > Clint Barton's badger-faced pinto (what are now called "paint horses") looks like [this](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/d6/16/18/d61618d6a5f12ee44be85a467338c2e7.jpg%22).


	5. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With the plan to catch the herd out the window, the boys have to think quick on their feet. Sam has a realization; Steve makes a new four-legged friend.

“Who is it?” Steve nearly shouts, and it’s too loud, he’s too loud, and somehow across the way Clint Barton hears, lifts his head and sees them. In that quick instant when their eyes meet, Clint Barton looks so goddamn guilty that Sam’s whole plan goes out the window as the train lurches forward.

“He’s one of Fury’s, we gotta get him,” says Sam, practically climbing over Steve to get out of the benches. Barton scrambles back to his horse.

“What? What about Gallup?” Steve’s rifle is already out in his hands.

“To Hell with Gallup, what’s he doing _here?!_ ” Of course Clint Barton would turn out to be a cattle hustler, that sleazy, lazy son of a bitch. He does nothing but play cards and skirt around Natasha Romanoff; Sam’s never liked him. He can bag Barton, and Barton’ll lead him to the others. “Change of plans, Steve, grab him!”

Barton’s kicking at the post where the ramp-cum-fence is secured. When it doesn’t work, he pulls an arrow from the quiver on his hip and slices it free. The large wood ramp clattering against the ground, still secured to the train on the other end, scares the horses enough to make Steve nervous approaching them.

Lee rears up and Barton cuts his reins. It’s the only thing securing the stallion to the train. Sam sees Steve lunge desperately for Spitfire, but she’s too far and all it does is let Barton know which horse belongs to the big, blond stranger, so he cuts her loose as well.

Steve’s brought the rifle to his cheek. Barton sheaths the arrow and sprints behind the horses for cover. Sam could swear he sees the man mouth “Sorry” to him before he smacks both horses on the rear, hard.

The crack of the rifle is loud, right in his ear, but Sam doesn’t see if the shot landed because both Lee and Spitfire, terrified out of their minds, leap right off of the moving train. He cranes his neck to see the horses land but the car’s in the way and the train’s too fast and goddammit, he’s going to have the man’s head-

Sam whirls to face Barton, who’s now mounted up and _tips his fucking hat at them_ before he takes the leap himself.

The pinto lands, doesn’t even stumble. Barton’s off like a gun heading for the horizon. Steve raises the rifle to fire again, but Sam puts his hand on the barrel. “We’ve gotta catch him, Steve.”

“How?!”

He takes careful steps to the edge of the platform, holding onto the post as he puts two fingers in his mouth and whistles, hoping.

An angry whinny answers and Lee’s suddenly cantering alongside the speeding train, pushing himself to keep pace. Spitfire, bless her big heart, is right behind him.

Sam turns to Steve.

“Are you _fuckin’ insane?_ ” Steve shouts.

“I’m just doing my job!” he yells back. He takes a running jump.

Sam lands hard in the saddle and ignores the pain shooting up in his gut, immediately peeling off towards Barton to give chase. He shouts and feels Lee push himself faster.

Over his shoulder, Steve’s still on the platform. Sam wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t jump— there was no way of knowing it’d turn out like this. It’s a little batshit to ask of him.

But the bastard jumps.

He misses.

Steve tumbles into the dirt, whirling so fast he’s just a blur of blue and khaki. Sam’s heart stops. Barton is gaining ground, and fast.

Sam’s got to make a choice.

He circles back around for Steve.

The train is loud as it passes by, and Spitfire is skittering away from the noise but eager to nose at Steve. Steve, who’s grabbing onto her bridle and lugging himself to sitting, standing, and he shakes his head as if to clear it. His hat’s gone, God knows where. Sam can see the rifle reflecting the light about twenty yards away.

“Steve!” he calls, slowing down to a trot near the tracks.

“I’ve—I’m good!” Steve answers, but his voice cracks. He stumbles towards the rifle and waves at Sam dismissively. “I’m alright, go get him! I’m— … I’m right behind you.”

Sam doesn’t need any more confirmation. He turns around again, digging his heels and leaning forward so that Lee takes off like a bullet. The stallion is thrilled: he was bred from wild horses, running is in his blood.

Barton was nearly a speck in the distance, but Sam’s gaining on him. The cattle thief's slowed down, probably saw Sam go back for Steve and figured himself safe.

Sam bears down on him, grinning gleefully as he waits for the moment Barton hears rapid hoofbeats. It comes late— Barton looks over his shoulder and his eyes widen. He tries to spur his horse into gear. The pinto whinnies and surges forward.

Łitugaa’s faster.

Sam tackles Barton right out of the saddle. They both land on their sides in the dirt, and it’s a mad scramble for the upper hand. Barton is laying on his bow, and he’s suddenly got an arrow to Sam’s throat. It’s too slow— Sam’s already got the pistol tucked under his chin.

“Aw, sheriff, no.”

“Hands up, you son of a bitch,” Sam growls.

Barton swallows and obliges. He drops the arrow and lays there with his palms open and up near his ears.

“I swear Wilson, it isn’t what it looks like,” he tries, but Sam just jams the gun harder against his jaw. “Goddammit, I’m—get off me, and I can explain.”

“You better have a damn good explanation.” He keeps the pistol trained on Barton but lets him up. “After that shit you just tried to pull? I’m gonna need a hell of a reason not to shoot you.”

“Shootin’ me’d be a federal crime, m’pretty sure,” mumbles Barton as he goes slowly for one of his saddlebags.

“What was that?” Sam’s left shoulder and hip are throbbing. He tries to shift his weight, but it doesn’t help.

“Nothing.” Barton produces a crumpled envelope and holds it out to Sam. “This might . . . clear things up.”

First, Sam puts himself between Barton and his horse— ready to stop him again if he makes another break for it. Then he snatches the envelope from his hands. Inside there are two heavy, official looking pieces of parchment. One is a warrant for the arrest of a man named Brock Rumlow, and the other-

Sam reads over it, narrowing his eyes at Barton. “Is this real?”

“Real enough for government work. That’s the governor’s signature at the bottom, I think.”

Hooves thunder closer to them— Sam sees a buckskin horse and blond hair out the corner of his eye. Steve slows down as he nears them, doesn’t attempt to leave the saddle but levels the Sharps right at Barton anyway. He’s filthy and battered, and there are a couple rips in his shirt edged with blood.

“What in the _hell_ was that?!” Steve snarls. His eyes are blazing like doesn’t even notice or care about his hurts.

“Steve.” Sam hands him the paperwork. “Take a look at this.”

Steve keeps the rifle trained on Barton with one hand. He glances over the paper, and Sam can see the moment the confusion hits and the gears start turning in his head.

“You’re a _Marshal_?” he says to Barton, unbelieving.

“Junior Marshal, technically,” Barton answers. He’s picking at his ear like he’s oblivious to both guns on him.

“Then what the hell you stealin’ cattle for?” says Sam.

Barton sighs, “No— I didn’t-” He clears his throat. “I didn’t steal any cattle. Nick knows what I am, knows I got a warrant for Rumlow. Backup’s supposed to be coming in from Arizona. Figured I’d cut ‘em off at Gallup when they stopped for supplies.”

“Who’s Brock Rumlow?” asks Steve.

“Another one of Fury’s,” says Sam, and at the same time Barton answers, “He’s got a posse they call Skeleton Crew.”

As many times as they’ve heard the name in the last few days, it gets both of their attention. Sam raises an eyebrow and gives Barton his best ‘go on’ nod.

“I got contacts,” Barton says. “I got it on good authority that the rest of ‘em are riding in from Flagstaff to meet him. We think they’re going to sell off the herd and circle on back for Jack Rollins before that circuit judge can get to Apache Springs.”

“So, what, the cattle theft was just a cover-up?” Steve says.

“Or a big ‘fuck you’ to Nick Fury.” Barton nods.

Sam doesn’t entirely blame them for wanting to pull one over on a man like that. He looks between the other two men. “Maybe both.”

“But Fury knew what you were doin’, right?” Steve’s got a look on his face like he’s thinking hard, and Sam knows he’s onto something, “So why’d he send us after you?”

“Hell if I know,” says Barton, spitting into the dirt. He’s long past keeping his hands up, and instead he’s got them resting on his belt now. “Don’t need you two chuckleheads knocking my ass into the dirt when I’m just trying to do my job.”

The pieces connect in Sam’s head. He gives an angry kind of shout, kicking at a rock lodged in the dusty ground. The horses skitter a bit away from him.

Barton looks at him, concerned. “You okay there, sheriff?”

“Sam?”

“He was goadin’ me to do my job,” Sam says, and looks Steve dead in the eye. “He wanted me out of town. No sheriff around to stop him.”

Steve’s shoulders slump, like he’s disappointed but isn’t surprised. “To stop what, though?”

“I don’t know. But we need to get back _now_.”

Barton has edged his way around Sam and has one foot in the stirrup by the time Sam’s got his gun back on him. “Well, it was nice talkin’ to you folks, but I’ve got a job to do. And now that I’ve missed my train-”

“Oh no, you’re coming with us.” Sam says.

“What? You _don’t_ want me to go for backup?”

“Flagstaff’s gotta be at least a week by horseback.” Steve offers, rifle across his lap. “You’d never get there in time.”

“We go back to Apache Springs, and we go back now.” Sam climbs up and settles back into Lee’s saddle, ignoring the bruising on the inside of his thighs. “See if we can stop whatever Fury’s planning.”

“What’re you gonna do, sheriff, shoot me?”

Sam’s so angry that he doesn’t hesitate, fires right into the dirt near Barton’s feet. The man scrambles back and screeches, “Alright!”

He immediately chambers another round. “Mount up. Let’s go.”

The ride back to Apache Springs is tense. They barely speak to one another, but Sam catches Steve’s concerned glances at him, even though Steve’s the one with bruises the size of his head. The first chance they get, they wash Steve’s blue shirt and rip it up for bandages: he wears a loose cotton nightshirt he had packed to avoid rubbing against any of his hurts and protect them from the sun.

When they settle down for the first night Barton is telling a story to Steve about riding across half of Nebraska with no shirt and no saddle.

“I just had pants, rode bareback. Lucky here just had a bit of rope for a bridle. He was real good about it, but it rubbed part of his nose raw a while.”

“That when he lost the eye?” Steve’s taken a liking to Barton, he can tell. Sam lays awake on his own blanket contemplating the merits of shooting him just to be done with it.

“No, that came later. My fault though, I was trespassing.”

“Indians?”

“Lakota. I fought and I fought to try to save his life. They said it was real respectful of me, taught me how to make my own bows after a while. This spoiled brat ate like a king.” Barton pats the pinto’s side fondly, and Lucky noses his hair. “Hey. _Hey_ , knock it off, no slobbering.”

Steve laughs. Sam has to fight not to smile at the sound of it. Instead he turns on his side with his back to them. They take the hint and speak much quieter until it’s time to switch off.

By the time they near Apache Springs, most of the tension’s bled out of Sam’s shoulders from exhaustion alone. Steve’s tried a couple times over the last days to start up a conversation with him. He brushes him off— he feels a little bad about it, but he’s tired. And _pissed_.

They follow the river south. The shoreline glitters in the heat. Steve’s pulling at the front of his shirt to fan himself, since he’s lost his hat and they didn’t have time to pick up another.

“No, no, no, _no_ ,” Barton says from behind him, and suddenly the bowslinger nudges Lucky into gear and is galloping forward to something only he can see.

Sam scoffs at first. It’s hot, it’s been hot, Barton’s got to be losing his mind. Hallucinating. Then he sees it too.

They’re coming up on Fury’s ranch— and it’s deserted.

There’s no cattle in the field, no cowhands lounging on the fences. Sam thinks he hears a wild, high-pitched whinny from the barn.

Barton’s already leapt off his horse and is sprinting towards the house. There are blankets and furniture scattered across the porch and grounds. Deep pocking around the doorway looks like shotgun spread.

“Thought they were supposed to be going for the jail.” He grunts and jumps down out of the saddle.

Steve copies him and Sam doesn’t miss the wince when his feet hit the ground. “Looks like they might’ve not gone north after all.”

Barton’s tearing around the inside of the house like a madman. They hurry inside to find a very similar scene. The table is overturned and splintered; chunks of mud are carved out of the walls. In the middle of the floor someone’s pried up the wooden floorboards and dug a hole, about two foot wide and three deep. There’s dirt everywhere.

Sam starts to say, “What the hell-”

“They’re not here.” Barton huffs. He scrubs his hand through his hair and it sticks straight up in places. “No one’s here and there’s no bodies.”

Another whinny. Sam hears it for sure, this time. He and Steve share a look and a nod— Steve’s got the rifle in his hand and it out the door.

“What the hell happened here? What were they going for?” Sam says again, gesturing to the hole in the floor.

“Kidnapping?” Barton shrugs. “Nick’s worth a lot of money.”

“Not without his herd.”

“Looking for something, then?”

“But what?” Sam tightens his grip on his revolver. It feels lighter somehow, easier now that he’s fired it at a man. Not to wound— annoying as Barton is, he doesn’t think he could actually kill him— but knowing he has the guts to aim and pull the trigger lifts a weight off of his shoulders, somehow. It probably shouldn’t. Being willing and able to shoot a man isn’t something Sam thinks he should be proud of.

There’s a distant, struggling call from outside. “A little help, fellas!”

The confidence in Sam’s chest drops to cold steel in his stomach when he realizes it’s Steve. He and Barton are outside the house in an instant. Another shout comes from inside the barn. The horses are watching the doorway nervously, ears straight up and eyes forward.

Sam presses his back against the wall next to the door. Barton nocks an arrow beside him and they share a nod.

He peers around the corner.

Steve, the great muscle-bound idiot, is wrestling with one of the biggest horses Sam’s ever seen— digging his heels into the dirt, lead wrapped around one arm with the other clinging desperately to a post. There’s a stall door in splinters on the floor. The horse is rearing up, kicking in all directions, screaming its big brown head off.

“This thing is— goddamn crazy!” Steve grunts, sidestepping to narrowly avoid a kick aimed at his middle before yanking the lead back again. “Broke—ngh—broke outta—n’ charged me!”

Miraculously, Steve’s holding it— him, Sam notes idly as he rears up again— back. The muscles in his neck and shoulders are straining, but Steve digs his heels in further and shouts: “Whoa!”

“Hey!” Barton’s slinging his bow back over his shoulder, holding his hands up trying to placate him. “Hey! Recognise me? Come on, dude, calm down!”

Jesus H. Christ, Sam’s surrounded by idiots. “Barton, that horse’s gonna kick you right in the face and I swear to God I will leave you lyin’ there in the dirt!”

To his surprise, the beast doesn’t rear up again. It huffs at them, stamps its front hooves and shakes its head menacingly— but when Steve lets the lead go a little loose to catch his breath, it doesn’t pull. It has to be a drafter of some kind; now that it’s standing relatively still Sam can eye it at about seventeen hands. Even Steve, the giant among them, barely comes up past its withers.

“There you go,” says Barton in his most calming voice. “You do, don’cha? See, we’re cool, we’re all cool here. It’s alright.”

“Barton, shut up,” Steve growls.

“No, wait, shh,” says Sam. He’s watching the horse watch Barton as he inches closer, its big barrel chest huffing and puffing. Ears are straight up, facing forward. Blinking slow as Barton approaches.

He takes the lead from Steve, well within kicking range, and the horse lets him do it. Steve edges around the monster while it’s distracted to pick his rifle back up where he’d apparently dropped it and stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Sam.

“You know this horse?” Steve says to Barton, once he’s caught more of his breath.

“Yeah,” Barton says softly. He reaches to pet its nose but pulls back quick when the beast snaps its teeth at him. “That’s right, you’re the biter.”

“Why would the posse raid the whole ranch and leave one horse?” Sam says, putting his pistol away.

Steve grumbles, “‘Cause it’s far more trouble than it’s worth.”

The horse brays menacingly in his direction. Steve tries hard not to jump and it comes off as a bit of a wince.

“S’pose you’re not gonna tell us what happened, are you, troublemaker?” Barton’s staring the horse down now, like the right amount of prolonged eye contact will have the animal speaking perfect English.

“We gotta get back to town,” says Steve, “See if anyone knows where they could’ve taken Fury.”

Sam turns to leave the barn, running through the townsfolk in his head. His shoulders sink when he realizes. He stops and doesn’t notice until Steve bumps into him.

“What?” says Steve.

“I know exactly who’d know about something like this,” Sam sighs. He pointedly looks at Barton. Barton, who slinks around the boardinghouse whenever he’s off-duty and who Sam has personally witnessed trying and failing to charm his way into free drinks with the bartender time and time again.

“Who, me? I’ve been with you the whole damn time-”

“Not you.” He says, rolling his eyes, “Natasha.”

“Romanoff? Well, of course she would.” Barton cuts himself off and quirks his lips up in a wry grin as he starts to laugh. “Oh, you think she’s my girl or something? That woman don’t _belong_ to anyone. You’re a hoot n’ a holler, sheriff.”

“Shut the hell up,” says Sam, and heads back outside.

The horses are waiting for them, ears flicking this way and that. Spitfire lifts her head from where she’s lying on the ground. Lucky takes a hesitant step forward until he sees Barton with the monster horse in tow and shies away again.

“C’mon, we’re not taking that thing with us, are we?” Steve grimaces. He sees Spitfire just as she climbs back to standing to nudge him gently. The beast shows his teeth at Steve. Steve reflexively glares back.

“Rogers, that poor horse is too tired to haul your heavy ass anywhere else,” says Barton, “so either you switch out for Goliath over here, or you’re walking.”

Steve offers to walk, but it doesn’t fly. Instead, he rides Lucky— the bigger between him and Lee— with Spitfire in tow. Barton rides double on the back of Sam’s saddle, towing the big brown beast. Sam hates every minute of it.

“Honestly, Steve, it’s good Lucky’s the most laid-back horse on this Earth. You look almost a natural,” Barton says. The sound of his voice so close to Sam’s ear makes his shoulders tense.

“I’ve been riding nonstop nearly a week, Clint.” Steve sounds tired. Not like he needs sleep, but more that he’s tired of being underestimated. “I think I’ve got a handle on it.”

Barton snorts. The Goliath is amusing himself nipping at Lee’s tail as it whips back and forth. He gives an undignified huff when Lee smacks him in the face, and Sam smiles a little to himself.

They reach town after nightfall. Barton’s clinging to his waist, complaining of the cold, and the relief of Apache Springs not looking raided or aflame as it comes into view is almost enough to temper Sam’s homicidal thoughts. He figures Doc Blake’s still got a handle on the jail so they ride right past the livery to the boardinghouse.

The town is small enough that news spreads quickly— Sam watches some of the kids run ahead of them to tell everyone in earshot that they’re back. Barton dismounts the first chance he gets. Sam’s not surprised when Natasha’s waiting in the doorway to the boardinghouse with her arms crossed.

He’s very surprised when the first thing out of her mouth is, “What the hell are you doing with my horse?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not many this time around:
> 
> > "bred from wild horses": Lee is a Mustang, a wild horse of the American west descended from horses brought overseas by Spanish Conquistadors. They are such symbols to this day that the U.S. has named cars and airplanes after them.
> 
> > On sheriffs versus marshals: Sam is called "sheriff" in this story, even though technically his position is Town Marshal. He is in charge of civil disputes and keeping the streets clean figuratively and literally - part of a town marshal's job was to sweep sidewalks and deal with stray dogs. Above Sam is the county sheriff, who will remain unnamed. Clint is a Federal Marshal (Junior, meaning he's got a direct supervisor to report to), and the letter he shows Sam is signed by the Governor of New Mexico allowing him to operate in the territory on behalf of the United States Government.
> 
> > Because a marshal like Clint operates on a national level, shooting him would most definitely be a federal crime.
> 
> > "pocking around the doorway looks like shotgun spread": Adobe mud is surprisingly bullet resistant. I watched a video where a guy went at a stack of bricks with an AK-47 and out of 20 rounds, only 1 went through. Tough stuff.
> 
> > Hands is a unit of length used to tell how tall a horse is, measuring up to their shoulders (withers). Seventeen hands is about 5'11" (1.8m). Steve is six foot (1.82m). The Goliath is . . . a very large horse.


	6. Hang 'em High

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam goes back to Apache Springs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The penultimate chapter. ~~All~~ Most is revealed.

“He’s _yours_?” Sam says in disbelief, even as Natasha walks up to the beast of a horse and reaches up to rub him between the eyes without fear. Even Steve is shocked into silence when the Goliath ducks his head for her and chuffs affectionately.

“As much mine as anyone’s,” she says fondly. “What are you doing with him?”

“What was your horse doing on Fury’s ranch?” Sam counters.

“I board him there. The stables in town are too small,” she says immediately, and something in Sam’s gut tells him it was too fast an answer.

“The ranch’s been raided,” Steve offers, and boy does that begin to draw a crowd. “Goliath’s the only thing we found.” He climbs down and loops Lucky’s reins around one of the posts.

“If you would’ve taken him out with more than just a lead, you would’ve seen he’s called Nomad,” says Natasha coolly. Both woman and horse are staring Steve down now, but he doesn’t shrink from the challenge, squaring his shoulders and resting his hands on his belt.

“There wasn’t exactly time. Nick Fury is missing.”

“You happen to know anything about that?” Sam says with his arms crossed. Natasha turns to look at him, and he sees her weigh a choice in her eyes.

“You’d better come inside.” She looks between the three of them, her gaze lingering on Barton for just a moment longer than Sam or Steve.

She hitches Nomad to a post without a problem— the Goliath seems perfectly content to be handled by her. There’s almost no trace of the mad animal Steve tussled with in Fury’s barn. Sam turns to Steve and is glad to see his own suspicion mirrored there. They hitch up Lee and Spitfire and follow her inside.

Sam grumbles as Barton pushes past him to fall into step beside Natasha with a sharp, “Tasha, what the hell is going on?”

“Plans changed,” she says curtly, climbing the staircase in the back of the bar and motioning for them all to follow. They’re getting quite a few looks from the cards tables patrons before they seem to decide it’s none of their business. Might have something to do with the rifle Steve’s got on his back in plain view.

“When?!” says Barton, throwing up his hands.

Sam and Steve share a look. This day is just getting longer and stranger.

“Clint, are you in on this?” Steve accuses. The clipped tone in his voice is exactly how Sam feels at the moment.

Barton doesn’t seem to hear him, and whines as she unlocks a door at the end of the hall, “We’re supposed to be partners, Tasha.”

“That was before you came riding back into town with the sheriff, and no Rumlow,” she snaps at him, before turning to meet Sam’s eyes. “Sorry, Sam.”

“Yeah, real sorry, I see.” He glares. She looks like she’s got real regret on her face, but to Sam this whole situation stinks bad enough that he doesn’t feel bad about losing his temper with her.

“Come on in. Have a drink.” Natasha lets them all in, closes and locks the door behind them quickly. “Keep your voices down.”

Nick Fury, alive and well and with a glass of something in his hand, seems just as surprised to see the three of them as Sam is to see him at all. “Sheriff.”

“Fury,” Sam says, and just like that all the anger of being rushed out of town, being deemed untrustworthy is back, bubbling in his blood. The pistol on his hip is heavy with five bullets in it— he hadn’t taken the time to reload but he should have because he’s seeing _white_. “You better have a damn good explanation—”

“How was Albuquerque, Sam?”

Rage spreads hot and tense across Sam’s shoulders. “Who the _hell_ do you think you are—?!”

“They stopped at the ranch,” says Natasha from the door. She’s pouring drinks, hands one to Barton, who accepts it with a nod. “Picked up Nomad, came straight here.”

“Did you know about the raid?” Steve says, stepping into the fray. “That why you sent us off?”

“Yes.” The one word weighs down the entire room like a wet wool blanket. It smothers some of the heat in Sam’s belly, but not enough to make him take his hand off his gun. Steve sees him flip the strap open and grabs his arm with a look. Sam pulls away from him and crosses his arms across his chest instead.

Sam grits his teeth, “ _Why_.”

“Natasha can answer that,” Fury says, taking a sip of his drink. Sam wants to smash it on the floor.

All the men in the room turn to look at Natasha, who’s looking at Fury with one eyebrow raised like she’s going to indulge him just this once before she takes him out back and shoots him herself. It restores just a little bit of faith in Sam’s heart.

“The raid was a coverup. Nick knew the herd getting stolen was just a distraction. We needed to get some things out of there before Rumlow’s crew came back for it.”

“We left Nomad so that I could hide out here without anybody connecting it to her,” Fury adds, pointing to Natasha. “But now you might as well have brought the whole town down on our doorstep—”

“ _My_ doorstep,” she interrupts him. With a pointed look at Barton she growls, “I’m not the one who blew my cover.”

“I was being pursued!” Barton raises his voice, defensive. Both Natasha and Fury shush him.

“You jumped off _a moving train_ on horseback!” Sam says, soft but intense. “That’s just about the guiltiest thing you could’a done!”

“I panicked! Rogers was shootin’ at me!”

“Wait.” says Steve. He steps in between Sam and Barton, looks right at Natasha, and narrows his eyes in confusion. “Blew your cover?”

Barton sighs, “Women can’t be marshals. That’s why it’s my name on the paperwork.”

It takes a moment to register, and Sam blinks. “So— you’re partners? Not _partners_.”

“Yeah.” Barton throws his arm around her shoulders. She elbows him like a brother, not a boyfriend, and he chuckles. “It’s never been like that with us. ‘Sides, she’s been doin’ Matt Murdock for a couple months now.”

Natasha shoves him hard for that. “Tell ‘em everything, why don’t you?!”

“They already know everything else!”

“Do we?” Sam says, looking between Natasha, Barton, and Fury. “Because I’ve had about five revelations too many in the last couple minutes.”

“Hold on.” Trust Steve to bring the conversation to heel— Sam’s head is still spinning trying to think if he’s ever even seen Natasha and Matt Murdock in the same room. “What was so important that you needed to ransack your own property to cover it up?”

Fury is suspiciously quiet then. It’s the tense kind of quiet that makes everybody pay rapt attention because it’s such a sudden absence of noise. “Antonio heard a rumor a couple of weeks ago. Now, I don’t know who told him, but when he showed up last week to try and goad me into selling the ranch, one of Rumlow’s men overheard some things he shouldn’t have. I overreacted, chased him out.”

“He all but told us you shot at him,” Steve says, accusatory.

“I did,” Fury admits, “but it was too late by then. Couple days later I caught Jack Rollins trying to sneak off to town early in the morning, probably to send a telegram south to the rest of the posse in Las Cruces. I sent Jasper after him to haul him back. Imagine my surprise when I found out he’d been shot and that Rollins, the guilty man, had been jailed. The next day, half my herd went missing. Barton rode off north to catch a train to Flagstaff, come back with more marshals. The day after that, you two showed up, so I sent you to try and catch up with the herd.”

Sam looks at Steve with a mix of regret and anger pounding in his chest, because they both know that Sam’s the one who made the call to go north. He’s the one who was wrong, and they lost nearly six days because of it. Steve’s eyebrows lift a little in what might be concern but Sam has to look away. Apologies can come later. He tries to take another menacing step towards Fury but Steve gets there first.

“When we called. You already knew they were going south then?” says Steve, so low in his chest it’s almost a rumble.

“They scattered the herd from here to Las Cruces while they were cuttin’ and runnin’. Found that one out after you’d left town.”

“You’re telling me Rumlow stole— _pretended_ to steal five hundred head to cover up getting away with knowing something?” says Sam. He’s trying to think of what it might be. “Why didn’t you tell me whatever it is when we came to you?”

“Then you’d know too. The circle’s small, sheriff, I had to keep that information under control.”

“And you don’t think you can trust me.” Sam says slowly, levelling a glare at Fury. The fire in his belly springs back to life and the words are out of his mouth before he can stop them. “Because I’m not Riley.”

Fury looks him dead in the eye and says nothing. That’s all the truth Sam needs.

“That’s why you sent me out of town, isn’t it? Because I’m not Riley, and I sure as hell ain’t in your pocket. This isn’t a matter of keeping the circle small, Nick, this is a matter of you thinking I’m not good enough to do my job.

“Well, like it or not, I am the lawman here, and from where I’m standing? The biggest disturber of the peace in my town is _you_. So you’d better come clean about this big secret of yours real quick before I _really_ do my job and leave you behind bars to rot.”

His little speech echoes in the quiet room. Steve is looking at him with a mix of pride and what Sam thinks might be fondness; even Fury himself looks mildly impressed.

“The ranch’s sitting on a gold vein.” Nick says then, and Sam’s stomach roils. “I had to get the deed out before Rumlow and his posse came back for it.”

Steve says softly, “That’s why you won’t sell.”

“I told you, not even Antonio could afford it. The herd meant nothing— I can buy another and he knew that.”

“So it was just a big ‘fuck you’,” Barton says, clearly impressed with himself.

“Do we have an idea of when they’ll be back?” Steve asks. He’s all business all of a sudden, and Sam can see the Union Army in his straight spine and squared shoulders.

“Las Cruces is only five days, there and back,” says Natasha, thinking. “It’s been almost a week now.”

“So anytime,” Steve says with an unsatisfied sigh.

Fury pats his pocket and a piece of paper rustles inside. “And that’s why I needed to get the deed.”

“If they know about the gold, Nick, what’s a deed gonna do?” asks Barton.

“Because it’s still my land,” Fury growls.

Sam thinks for a moment, because Barton’s on to something. “Yeah, on paper. But your ranch just got raided. What happens when the Skeleton Crew pulls up and sees abandoned land for the taking?”

“They sieve as much gold as they can find from the riverbed, then claim the land for their own before someone comes along and takes it,” Steve answers for him. The riverbed— Sam hadn’t even noticed when they rode in. It was glittering. _Glittering_.

Steve’s right. A piece of paper isn’t going to stand very long in anyone’s path to that kind of wealth.

There’s a knock on the door and Sam draws his pistol. Steve’s got the rifle in his hands, finger on the trigger guard; Barton draws his bow. Natasha draws a couple of thin knives from somewhere in her skirts— the confident glint in her eyes makes Sam think she just may be the deadliest of them all. Barton nods to her to open it. She gives him a deadly look and waves for them all to stand to the side so that the room’ll look empty when she does.

The latch clicks, she draws it open with the knives clenched like claws in her fist behind her back—

“< _Finally_ ,>” says Tony, exasperated, “<Downstairs they said you’d come up here with a number of “suitors”. What, you thought you could have a meeting of the minds and I wouldn’t know about it?>”

He bullies his way into the room, and Natasha shoves it shut quickly behind him. It’s not that large a space— far too small to be comfortable for six people, most of whom are armed. Barton whacks Steve in the middle with the tip of his bow on accident. Steve grunts and tries to step further out of the way despite clearly being the largest man there.

“Anthony,” Fury says curtly, and there’s a shotgun casually aimed Tony’s way that everyone’s got an eye on. “This doesn’t concern you.”

The Baron doesn’t look fazed in the least. Instead, he’s got his feet planted shoulder-width and is ignoring the double-barrel entirely. He gives a frustrated sigh and speaks in heated English with clenched fists: “It does. It _is_ , because this town is mine as much as any of yours. Now. What are you discussing?”

“Fury faked a raid on his own ranch to cover up the fact he’s sitting on gold,” says Sam. Fury narrows his eye at him and starts to give an indignant shout, but Sam cuts him off, “You may’ve done what you thought was right and left me out’ve it, but I’ve got a duty to protect my town and all the bastards in it— even you. We’ll help you defend your land, but _everything_ stays in the open now, understand?”

Fury doesn’t give a yes or even a nod, but he doesn’t say anything to the contrary, which is good enough for Sam. He turns back to Tony and continues, “We know there’s a crew comin’ up from Las Cruces to claim his ranch, now that for all intents and purposes it’s sitting empty.”

“That I did know,” says Tony. To Fury he says, “You chased off my boy.”

“Your _spy_ , you mean.” Fury snaps, defensive.

“Agh,” Tony waves a dismissive hand, “Yes, same thing.”

“So we close ranks. We know they’re coming back, and soon,” says Steve.

“Steve and I’ll go back to the ranch with Nick.” Sam thinks by this point he doesn’t even need to ask, but he looks over at Steve anyway and is pleasantly surprised when the man nods at him. “Hold down the fort, drive ‘em off when they get here. Now, none a’ you have to come along but I’d sure appreciate the backup.”

“Well, you know I’m in,” Steve says with a grin, like it’ll be a fun, light-hearted adventure and there’ll be absolutely no need at all for the rifle in his hands.

“An’ we still got a warrant out on Rumlow,” Barton adds. Natasha nods along. The knives are mysteriously gone from her hands, but Sam’s sure he saw them.

“So much for disappearin’,” says Fury— there’s a mix of anger and pride in his voice. Sam doesn’t think Nick’s got shit to be proud of at the moment, but he keeps that to himself. “What good would I be if I didn’t show up to my own damn funeral?”

“You should not talk like that, it’s bad luck,” Tony says with his hands in his pockets. They’re all looking at him now— the only man in the room left to declare.

When he doesn’t answer right away, Steve raises an eyebrow and gives Tony a look like all of Heaven would rain judgement on him to eternity should he refuse. “You’re not comin’ with us?”

“I am a businessman, Rogers, not a fighter,” says Tony smartly, tucking his hand in his waistcoat. “I build, I do not break.”

“Mm-hm.” Sam’s got a feeling that Steve Rogers has stepped in to make sure Justice’s scales get tipped just the right way. Maybe he offered to hold them for her, like a gentleman. Sam wouldn’t put it past him to take on that big a problem— he’s already all but offered himself up to this tiny six-horse town on the edge of the desert.

But he doesn’t mind; he likes having Steve at his back.

The Baron’s got a willpower to match Steve’s, apparently, because all he does in the face of this is tilt his head like Steve’s just the cutest mutt he’s ever seen. “I will not come with you. But only because you need someone to stay in town and keep an eye out for them.”

Sam blinks— he hadn’t even thought of that. It makes sense, the ranch being north of town, that the Crew’d ride straight through Apache Springs first. He nods, just as surprised at the Baron having a plan that’s more than just self-serving as he is surprised to find himself agreeing. “Alright. We’d better go, then.”

Another knock, faster and heavier like the person on the other side this time is using both fists. “Mr. Baron! Mr. Baron, are you in there?”

There’s a brief silence as everyone at glances at one another. Sam doesn’t recognize the voice, young and crackling worse than wax paper.

“That is for me,” says Tony as he goes for the door. Steve puts a hand on his shoulder, and the Baron gives him a look dripping with disdain. “Sheriff, will you tell your big, blond, and beautiful dog to keep his paws off?”

“Oh! Uh. Sorry, Mr. Baron, if you’re busy,” the young voice says. “I know you told me to come find you if something urgent came up and it did, but you sound busy and I don’t want to interrupt anything, I can just go—”

With a long-suffering sigh, Tony wrenches open the door. There’s a kid on the other side, the coach driver from before, who stumbles in and blinks wide-eyed at the group of people in the room.

“Hey, everyone.” Sam hears the kid’s voice crack again and Jesus, how old is he? “I’m Peter.”

“You do not need to introduce yourself,” says Tony. “You came to tell me something?”

“Uh . . .” Peter looks a little dazed, and his big eyes flit from person to person, taking in the dusty boots and loaded firearms, Barton’s bow and arrows. His gaze lands on Sam and the kid audibly swallows when he sees the tin star on his belt. “Uhm. I. . .”

“Would you like to step back out and try a second time?” Tony crosses his arms.

“No— Oh! I remember now. I remember, Mr. Baron, you told me to tell you if there was anybody suspicious riding through town, and Luis told me that Scott— I, I didn’t really catch all of it, it was really really fast and you know I’m still not so fast with Spanish, I need to slow things down in my head still— but I think Luis said that Scott told him that Hank saw about half a dozen riders skirting town and heading north. Looked like they were in a hurry, he said.”

That spurs the whole room into action. Tony claps the kid on the shoulder and says hurriedly, “Next time, you will begin with that, yes?”

“Sounds like we’d better get going,” Sam says, looking over the little ragtag group. If the kid was right, it’d be six hustlers and five of their own— not bad odds, but the thought still doesn’t inspire much confidence.

The five of them— Sam, Steve, Natasha, Barton, and Fury— hurry out and down the stairs. Peter makes a move to follow them but he’s yanked back, no doubt by Tony wanting to keep a kid his age away from the possibility of a firefight.

As soon as Sam steps out into the street, the horses know there’s something going on. Spitfire looks between him and Steve with her ears folded back; Lee holds his head high and stamps the ground in anticipation.

Sam does the math. Four horses for five people. Steve starts to unhitch Spitfire’s reins but Sam grabs his arm to stop him. Time is of the essence— they need speed, and Steve’s too big a man for Spitfire to gallop all the way to the ranch.

Barton seems to pick up what Sam’s thinking, and hands Spitfire off to Fury instead. Nick mounts up without much trouble, but Spitfire seems confused at the switch and watches Steve warily. Then Barton leaps into his own saddle. Lucky rears a little, excited.

Sam busies himself dropping any extra weight he can from Lee and Spitfire. He darts inside to set the extra saddlebags behind the bar and asks Maria to keep an eye on them.

Back outside, Natasha produces another knife from nowhere and cuts a long gash in the side of her skirt from her hip to her knee. Barton chuckles. The knife is sheathed in a garterbelt high on her thigh, and Sam, having never seen it before, briefly wonders how much he actually knows about Natasha Romanoff. She grabs Nomad’s lead, and a handful of his mane, and swings gracefully on top of the beast.

“Come on, Rogers,” she says, holding a hand out to Steve. “You gonna stand there all day?”

Steve gives Sam a look like it’s suddenly his fault that the Goliath is the only horse big enough to carry him and still run, before turning back to glance at said beast. Nomad has the same look of distrust that Steve wears— but there’s no time to be uncomfortable with the situation.

“I’ve never—there’s no saddle,” Steve tries weakly.

Sam climbs into Lee’s saddle and lets the stallion prance in a little circle in his excitement. “We’ve gotta go, we’re losing time!”

Barton and Fury have already started to edge down the street. Lucky rears a little and stamps his front hooves.

“We’re going to try and beat them there!” Barton calls. “They’ll be looking south for us, come in from the west if you can!”

Sam nods and his fingertips brush the brim of his hat. Barton whistles and Lucky races off as fast as he can, Spitfire following loyally behind.

On Sam’s left, Steve is using one of the hitching posts as a mounting block and slides in behind Natasha. He’s hesitant to touch her at all, but there’s nothing else to hold on to so she wraps his arms around her waist for him.

“Don’t let go,” she says, guiding Nomad with her knees. “And don’t fall.”

Natasha clicks her tongue, and her giant beast springs into action. Lee is off like a gun, kicking up so much dust that Sam reaches for the bandana at his throat to pull up over his face. It’s not there.

Then he remembers— they’d washed it in the river on the way back from Albuquerque, wrapped it around Steve’s wrist where he’d torn it open jumping from the train. He looks to his right, where Nomad, despite the weight of two riders, is keeping pace with Lee fairly easily. Even under the open New Mexico sky, the blue bandana stands out on Steve’s wrist against the white nightshirt he’s still wearing.

Sam whistles and nudges his horse faster. Lee whinnies in response, head bobbing as he tears up dust. He focuses on speed, on beating the Skeleton Crew to the ranch. He tries not to think about what might happen if they don’t.

He’s not even sitting in the saddle as he races north, his badge on his belt and his pistol heavy at his side. Barton had said to come in from the west, but there’s no time to reroute.

It couldn’t have been more than thirty minutes. But Sam knows they’re too late when he smells fire.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A dialogue- and action-heavy chapter means only a few notes this time around:
> 
> > "cuttin' and runnin'"/"cut and run": This phrase was first used figuratively in the mid 1800s in the U.S. Originally, I wanted to use "get the hell out of Dodge", a classic Western phrase, but that would be anachronistic - Dodge City, Kansas was a popular setting for Western films of the early to mid-20th century, which is where the phrase came from.
> 
> > "hold the fort": First usage I could find was from a military order from General Sherman to General Corse at Allatoona in 1864. It's timely, don't @ me.
> 
> > The Skeleton Crew was a group of Cap villians from the 90s, originally set up by Red Skull. More on them next chapter, I don't want to give too much away. ;)
> 
> As always, if you'd like to know more about something (even if it's just "what the hell was she thinking?!") let me know in the comments. :D


	7. How the West was Won

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam and company catch up to the Skeleton Crew.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A warning for canon-typical violence and brief discussions of character death in this chapter.

The night is cool and clear, not hazy and heavy and _hot_ like it is during the day. So Sam can see it plainly from almost a mile out when Nick Fury’s barn, the only structure for miles around that’s made of wood, starts to go up in flame.

He can see Barton and Fury take a sharp left ahead of them. They swing wide to pull up from the west, not the south, just like Barton had suggested. Sam nods to Natasha to follow their lead.

As he gets closer, he sees half a dozen riderless horses gathered in the small clearing between the ranch house and the burning barn. They’re wild, mean looking things, with sheared manes and clipped tails. They’re not tethered or hitched anywhere, just chomping at their bits like the riders had hopped off and left them there for greener pastures.

Barton and Fury dismount and sneak behind the storehouse, a good distance from the other two buildings but still close enough to see and hear. Sam follows their lead. He hears Steve _thump_ heavily onto the ground behind him.

Sam flicks the button open on his holster and pulls out the revolver. He’d never reloaded it, so he’s got five bullets for six men. Hopefully he doesn’t have to use them.

Sam’s not feeling very hopeful right now. 

“I don’t want this to end in a fight, Steve,” Sam says quietly as Steve comes up beside him. They’re both fixated on where Barton, in all his bravery or idiocy, is trying to peer around the corner into the house.

Steve sees he’s expecting an answer and quickly breathes, “Yeah, I know.”

“Steve.”

“I _know_ ,” Steve repeats like an insolent child— except he’s got a loaded rifle in his hands that Sam _knows_ he knows how to use.

“Rogers,” Sam grabs his collar and pulls him forward to really look at him, nailing him with a glare as he whispers sharply, “I will not hesitate to arrest you again. I mean it.”

“Fat load of good that’ll do you now,” mutters Steve as he pulls out of Sam’s grip.

“They’re in the house, I can see ‘em.,” Barton says quietly, bow in his hands. He turns back to face the rest of them properly., “I’m gonna see if I can get a closer look.”

Fury takes Barton’s reins from him and gives him a nod.

“Clint—” Natasha starts to say, but Barton puts a finger to his lips and she cuts herself off. Then he holds his right hand out with his palm up like he’s holding a platter and uses that to gesture to all of them, before bringing it up to poke himself in the chest with his thumb, fingers still spread. With a wink and a smile, he creeps to the other end of the storehouse and around the corner.

Sam turns to Natasha for an explanation. She shrugs and mouths, “We’ll be fine.”

Nick’s been collecting reins and gathering the horses close. Luckily, the storehouse is tall enough that even Nomad can’t peer over it to give them away. Spitfire, to Sam’s surprise, looks to be the most nervous among them— the crackling of the flames has her shifting her weight like she’s gearing up to bolt. Steve slides the rifle strap back over his shoulder and reaches to soothe her.

Nomad, the big brown _bastard_ , snaps his teeth and Steve can’t pull away fast enough. He manages to swallow back most of his cry of pain, so it becomes more of a strangled grunt as he clutches his hand to his chest. The beast nickers and holds his proud head high.

There’s an angry shout from inside the house. They all freeze, Steve most of all, hanging his head with a grimace on his face. Sam puts a hand on his shoulder to check on him. Steve glances up and nods, mouthing “I’m okay” and shaking out his hand. He sends a fierce glare in Nomad’s direction.

“Who’s out there?” Someone barks from the doorway, a voice that’s low and gravelly and bitter like bad whiskey. Sam knows immediately that it’s Rumlow. There’s hushed conversation that Sam can’t make out over the crackle of the flames in the background. Then Rumlow shouts again, “Come out with your hands up!”

Steve, the dumb mother, starts to rise. Sam is alarmed and yanks him back down. He shakes his head violently trying to get his message of _no way, what in Hell is wrong with you_ across proper. But Steve isn’t looking at him. Steve is looking over Sam’s shoulder, and when Sam turns he sees Clint Barton, bow drawn, making himself comfortable below one of the ranch house’s wax paper windows. Barton looks back at them and nods. He’s waiting for a cue.

Another voice from inside the house— female, distressed: “Help me!”

“Come on out!” shouts a second man, “unarmed, hands up, before I blow her brains out!”

Sam’s grip tightens on his pistol, his thumb starting to pull the hammer back. Steve puts a hand over his to stop him.

“We know you’re there, Nick,” Rumlow drawls. “Or is it our very own sheriff out there? You finally come to stop a crime before it happens?”

The woman is struggling in the background. Sam can’t see, but he can hear them dragging her out of the house. His heartbeat starts pounding in his ears as anger grips his chest tight.

“I got six bullets!” The second man yells. “Real hard to miss this close up.”

Rumlow growls, “Scarbo, shut up.”

Sam hears the woman whimper again. The horses stamp nervously, and Nick is struggling to keep all four of them out of sight.

“Thirty seconds!” says Rumlow. “Show your face, and nobody’s gotta get killed.”

There’s a flutter of movement out the corner of Sam’s eye. It’s Barton, who has his bow tucked up under his shoulder and is making another one of those motions with his hands, over and over. He seems like he’s trying to get Natasha’s attention. Sam looks to his left— and she’s creeped around to the other side of the storage house with her back to them.

Barton has both his hands in an ‘L’ shape, the right thumb against his chin before he brings it down to stack his hands on top of one another. Sam no idea what in the hell that’s supposed to mean— he turns back to Natasha but she’s disappeared, probably snuck around the corner. He can feel himself very, very quickly losing his grip on this situation as he tries to think through what to do. He glances at Fury, who’s on his feet with two sets of reins in each hand, and Steve, who’s staring intently at Barton like he’s trying to remember what he had for breakfast.

“There ain’t nobody out there, Brock,” a third man says.

“Goddammit all, I know I heard something.” Rumlow’s voice is much closer now. Sam grips his gun tighter.

Barton makes the motion again, violently, and then points in the direction of the sobbing hostage.

“Sister.” Steve breathes. “She’s somebody’s sister.” Then he points at Barton and makes the same motion. Barton shakes his head. Steve gives him a thumbs up.

Sam doesn’t know what is happening. Steve is slinging the rifle over his shoulder, putting a hand on Sam’s arm, his shoulder, his face. Kissing him.

Steve is _kissing_ him.

It’s short, and Steve pulls away with a nervous smile that falters a little. “Sorry.”

It’s like his mind is having difficulty giving directions to the rest of him. Sam feels rooted to the spot, so he can only watch as Steve stands up straight and nods to both him and Fury— _Nick saw everything_ — and rushes around the corner.

Sam doesn’t have to look to know that Barton is staring at him too. 

“Who in the Hell are you?” Rumlow sneers. The sound of guns cocking brings Sam mostly back to himself.

“I’m,” Steve starts, and pauses like it might be a trick question, “I’m Steve Rogers.”

“Who you work for?” asks another voice, not Rumlow’s but a little further away. Sam thinks it might be the goon holding the woman.

“Nobody,” says Steve. Sam’s got his gun out for real this time and shuffles quietly to the corner to get a look. Barton mirrors him from across the way. Then Steve, the smartass, says, “Well, if you want to get specific—”

“Why are you here, Steve Rogers?” Rumlow’s voice stands out against the flames eating at the empty barn in the background. Every word sounds like a threat.

“Just passin’ through. Listen to my voice, do I sound like I’m from around here?”

The second guy chuckles. “Oh, we got ourselves a funny man, boys.”

Sam rolls his eyes. It’s just like Steve Rogers to confuse the hell out of him and then run off to pick a fight to the death. He takes a deep breath.

“You’ll be okay, miss. I’m gonna get you out of this.” Steve says calmly, and the woman is whimpering and the flames roar as something creaks and collapses with a big _huff_ of heat. “Well, me and my friends.”

Barton’s already got an arrow nocked and lets it fly on cue. Sam is rushing out, pistol up, and watches the man holding the sister go down, clutching his leg. He fires into the air and steps right between Rumlow and Steve. He hears horses shriek and doesn’t know which ones.

“Hands to Heaven, everybody!” he shouts.

The Skeleton Crew just laughs. Sam can see now that there’s seven of them— Rumlow, the man on the ground, and the woman bent over him outside, and four more stepping out of the ranch house doorway. There’s five guns, all on Sam, but the one he can’t get his eyes off of is Rumlow’s.

It’s a wicked-looking pistol with a thin barrel, and it’s aimed right at his chest.

He’s never quite looked down a barrel like this before, and his own gun is still aimed for the sky.

He shouldn’t have fired. There’s only four bullets left now.

Two of the Crew’s guns swivel as Barton steps into the firelight with another arrow nocked. “You heard the sheriff, Brock.”

“Clint Barton, and on the other side of the law. Thought I’d never live to see the day,” drawls Rumlow, amused but not taking his gun off Sam.

“Yeah, get used to it,” Barton says. “You got a lot of shit to answer for.”

“I don’t think I will. Just found myself a rich little plot of land. Think I might settle down,” Rumlow says. He tuts and turns back to face Sam. “Sheriff. This is who you bring for backup? A deadbeat criminal, and— this moron? This dumb city slicker ain’t shit, Wilson. You really oughta get yourself a proper deputy.”

“He don’t need one,” growls Steve from behind him.

Sam hisses, “Shut up, Rogers.”

“Hey, Brock,” Barton says. Rumlow lazily looks his way. There’s an amused grin on his face and steel in his eyes as he quips, “You talk too much.”

Hell breaks loose. Natasha Romanoff jumps or flies or _something_ out of nowhere and tackles Rumlow to the ground, landing cleanly with a knee in his chest and a foot on his gun hand. At the same time, Barton fires. Sam doesn’t see where the arrow goes.

Sam brings his own gun down and aims for the pack of Crew in the doorway. He pulls the trigger without thinking. It’s the same time as one of the goons, and a bullet slices into his arm. He drops his gun with a shout.

The pain feels like his whole arm is aflame a moment, but he looks and it’s just a slice. Steve steps in front of him with the Sharps to his cheek. He stands tall and proud, shoulders back and eyes front, like a soldier. “You okay?”

“Fine,” Sam grits out, grabbing his gun with his other hand. Steve offers a hand and helps him back to standing.

Around them, the action is too fast to see properly. He sees one of the goons make a break for the horses and raises his pistol to fire again. Steve fires first, and misses, but the horses skitter at the sound and the man whips around, drawing his own gun. 

Sam fires without thinking, and the goon drops.

There’s no time to dwell on it, but he’s never killed somebody before now and the thought of it floods his mind. It’s not what he wanted, he didn’t mean for it to happen— the goon shouldn’t’ve— Everybody was supposed to come peacefully.

There wasn’t supposed to be a fight.

There’s no time to dwell on it.

When Sam turns around, he’s not sure how much time has passed, because Steve’s ten foot away with the Sharps lying on the ground and his hands up and the sister holding a thin knife right up to his throat. Steve swallows and a thin red line starts to trickle down from the meat of his neck.

Barton is wrestling with the biggest of the Crew on his left; Sam doesn’t know where Natasha is, because he’s focused on Steve and that knife and that woman. There’s a pained grunt behind him that he thinks might be her doing.

“Steve Rogers!” Rumlow bellows, and Sam nearly jumps out of his skin. Rumlow looks a mess— half his face is cut and swollen like someone, maybe Steve, tried to beat it in. He’s silhouetted by the flaming barn, now just a burning pile of wood in the middle of the ranch. It’s brighter than daylight, and almost hurts to look at. “People are dead, Rogers.”

“Shoulda come peacefully.” Steve’s jaw is tense and his chin held high. “Usually works out better that way.”

“You keep your mouth shut, big fella,” the sister hisses, sliding her knife a little forward. Steve tries to fight the wince. It reminds Sam of the look he wore trying cactus wine. Was that really only a week ago?

Rumlow is breathing heavy through his mouth, heaving and hawing as he raises his revolver right at Steve.

Sam doesn’t think, just charges. He tackles Rumlow across the middle and they land on a burning pallet that might’ve been the barn roof once. Rumlow _screams_ , and it’s hot and the air is thick and heavy around them, but Sam kicks the gun out of his hand, grabs him by the face and slams his head into the ground. Again. And again. And again.

Thunder cracks sharp and loud behind him, and a woman screams. It’s just enough like Natasha that he staggers to his feet and out of the fire. Sam wipes the sweat and smoke and ash out of his eyes to see the sister on her side on the ground, clutching her leg. Steve is leaning over her, wearing that concerned look on his face.

Fury walks into the clearing with a smoking shotgun. He must’ve—Sam turns to look at the woman on the ground again. Sees Natasha hit a member of the Crew over the head and bind his wrists.

“That it?” Sam says. He can’t think of anything else to say. His blood is still pumping in his ears, drowning out most of the sound.

“Sheriff!” Barton shouts. Sam whips to face him, but the archer is pointing with a free arm, the other being occupied holding down a thrashing criminal.

Behind him, he hears hooves. Turns. One of the horses— not theirs, Sam doesn’t recognize it— is galloping at full speed away from the ranch. Rumlow is pulling himself up into the saddle, bloody and beaten and burned as he is.

Sam raises the gun in his hand and shuts one eye to aim. He takes a breath and lets it out through his mouth. Fires at Rumlow’s retreating back.

He misses.

He fires again. The gun clicks— empty.

“Shit,” he breathes. Drops the gun, because his arm is shaking. Presses his free hand to it to stem the blood, and Christ that hurts more than he expected. Like someone’s twisting up his muscles with a fork.

Steve is beside him then. He doesn’t say anything, just rests his hand on Sam’s good shoulder. Sam nods— there’s no real need for words right now.

“That’s it, I think.” Fury says, calm and collected, barely ruffled by the firefight. He’s reloading his shotgun before slinging it across his back. Sam breathes. It’s over.

They take stock. Of the six remaining Skeleton Crew, only three are still alive— one of them is the sister, who spits in Steve’s face and curses them as he pull her away from a body to bind up her leg as best he can. Sam catches a glimpse and can immediately see the resemblance. The man who was holding the girl, the man who Barton shot in the leg and who must’ve bled out sometime between then and now, the man Rumlow called “Scarbo”. It hurts to know that somebody lost a brother today because of him, regardless of the situation.

Sam lets Barton drag the bodies into the fire and tries not to look too hard at the man he knows he killed.

The sun is starting to rise over the river.

“We should get back, Sam,” Natasha calls gently. She’s got Nomad’s lead in one hand and Lee’s reins in the other. Barton is busy behind her tethering the remaining Crew members to their horses. Sam recognizes them now— Joe and Danny. They’d been Fury’s cowhands for a while now. Aside from being wanted criminals, apparently.

Fury isn’t looking at anyone, just staring into the ashes of the barn as the flames burn themselves out.

“Nick,” says Sam, taking Lee’s reins.

“Gonna have to do a lot of rebuilding around here,” Fury says quietly as he heads for the horses. He takes one that belonged to a dead Crew member, and it’s clear the animal knows him from the way it flicks its tail.

Steve nearly embraces Spitfire, pressing his forehead to hers for a long moment. She chuffs affectionately at him and he mounts up with ease.

As the sun rises, Sam and Steve ride in front, towing the three criminals. Natasha, Barton, and Fury ride behind. The heat of the day has almost fully returned when they make it back to town.

It’s a very different arrival than it was last night. People are whispering from doorways, keeping their kids inside. No doubt news has spread quickly. They head right for the jailhouse, down the empty street.

Empty aside from Antonio and his boy Peter, who are outside the jailhouse waiting for them. Antonio has a sour expression on his face and is tapping his foot like the whole affair has been on his dime.

“What,” says Sam as they pull up. He’s too tired to phrase it as a question.

“There has been trouble, you missed the fun,” Antonio says, looking over their little train of criminals and peacemakers. “And your judge arrived this morning.”

Sam closes his eyes and allows himself a frustrated sigh. He’d forgotten about the judge.

“Sheriff Wilson.” Speak of the devil, the judge himself steps right out of the jailhouse in a trim blue suit and clean white hat, hands resting on his belt. He’s too well-groomed for this town, and his clean face and hands make Sam feel too singed around the edges and itching for a bath. “Leaving a doctor in charge of the jailhouse? Losing a prisoner?”

“Judge Pierce, Your Honor,” Sam says, and dismounts slowly to buy himself time. They’d just gotten here, what did he mean losing a prisoner, he couldn’t possibly know about Rumlow. Unless he means— 

“Jack Rollins escaped during the night,” Antonio offers. Pierce turns to try and silence him with a glare, but the Baron just looks unimpressed.

“He had help from the outside. Where was your deputy, Sheriff?”

Sam starts, “I don’t— “

“We were all with him, Your Honor,” Steve cuts in. Pierce blinks at what he thinks must be insubordination. “We were tracking down a band of cattle hustlers and stake claimers.”

“The five of us were still outnumbered,” Clint says, hopping down from his horse to offer the offended judge his hand. “Howdy. Clint Barton, federal Marshal.”

“Alexander Pierce, territory judge. Sheriff, if you don’t have someone to be tried, I don’t see why—” 

“Actually, we have three. Right here.” Sam gestures to them. “Members of the Skeleton Crew.”

After a long, long pause where Pierce does nothing but look at them all, he concedes, “I see that.”

“These people have stolen my property, raided my homestead, and attempted to stake a claim on land I purchased through the United States Government,” Nick Fury says. “I would like to testify against them in Santa Fe.”

“Where’s the rest of them?” asks Pierce. “The Skeleton Crew is eight at last count, not three.”

Steve and Barton start to answer at the same time, but Sam clears his throat. “Three are dead. Brock Rumlow, who Marshal Barton here has a federal warrant for, escaped and likely was the one to come here and bust Jack Rollins out. Our next move will be tracking him down.”

“Sheriff, this is not the case I came all the way out here for—” 

“You’re right, sir. It’s a bigger one.” Sam might be glaring at Pierce a little bit, because he’s tired and burnt and his arm _hurts_ and he knows that Pierce won’t be able to resist his his name associated with bringing down a whole gang like this. “You and your men can escort these three back to Santa Fe, and I will let you know the moment we find Rumlow and Rollins.”

“You wouldn’t have had this problem if you’d named a proper deputy when I suggested, Wilson.”

“That’s on my list, Your Honor. Lot of work to do around here.”

“See to it that you get one soon.”

“Of course. Your Honor, it’s a pleasure, as always.” Sam offers a hand, knowing exactly how he looks. Dirty, dusty, singed. He’s not surprised when Pierce doesn’t take his hand and simply nods his agreement.

The judge gestures to his entourage to take custody of the remaining Crew. Nick follows their lead, riding a little off in the direction of the stables before he stops to face Sam again. “You’d better keep an eye on my property, Sheriff.”

Sam nods and gives a lazy mock-salute. As an added punch, he quips, “You know you can trust me.”

Fury watches him for a moment before letting a small, wry smile slip. “That I can.” And turns to ride away.

It’s not until late the next day that Sam gets a chance to talk to Steve, between being seen by the (very apologetic) doc, eating, sleeping, and in general enjoying being clean and _home_. Steve stops by the little jailhouse with a soft knock. “Tony says I’m free to go.”

Sam sits up a little at that. After everything, he hadn’t necessarily considered that Steve would still leave. “Well, are you going to?”

Steve hesitates. He opens his mouth, closes it again. “I don’t know. Depends.”

“On what?”

More hesitation. A sigh. Steve licks his lips and can’t quite look Sam in the eyes. “Listen. What I . . . did. I must’ve just read things wrong, and I understand if you want me to go, but—”

“Steve,” Sam says softly, and Steve snaps his trap shut. Sam stands, takes his time walking around his desk, leans on the edge. “You didn’t read anything wrong. Wrong time, maybe. And I might’ve appreciated you askin’ first. But it was . . . right. I think.”

“You think?” Steve forces out a nervous chuckle, but there’s a redness creeping across his cheek. “What’s that mean?”

“Well, aren’t you still goin’ after your boy?”

“I’ve been thinkin’ about that. And I think Becca’s right. I— I came out here because, hearing that news, I— I missed him. I still miss him, fierce, but. I can’t— he’s dead. And no matter how bad I miss him, I can’t change that. I can’t keep goin’ over everything, thinkin’ about what I’d do different.” He pauses, taking his new brown hat off his head and toying with the edge. “Instead, I’d rather— I’d rather do good where I can. I think he’d like that. And I think I can do that here, if you’ll have me.”

Sam’s not good with feelings. He knows he can’t say what he wants, in that flowery language the poets and the letter-writers use. So instead he just picks up the little tin star he had made— special order, rushed, but Tony had his guys do it free when he learned who it was going to. He tosses it to Steve, who catches it more out of instinct than anything.

Steve rubs his thumb over the letters, mouths “d-e-p-” and the rest to himself. He swallows around something thick in his throat. Sam can see the little red line where Susan Scarbo nicked him.

The silence stretches on and starts to grow heavy and awkward.

“Sam, I can’t—”

“You might hafta—”

They both stop. Steve looks at him and says, “You go first.”

“You might have to wrestle Joaquin for it.” Sam grins. “Kid’s been talking about getting one of his own once he’s old enough.”

“You sure about this?” Steve looks up from the star and dead into Sam’s face.

“Can’t think of anyone better.” Sam steps forward and offers his hand to shake.

Steve looks at his hand and back up to him. “Sam?”

“Yeah?”

“Can I kiss ya?”

Just the thought makes Sam smile a little brighter. “Not while you’re on duty, deputy.”

Steve laughs at that, low and hearty. His grins takes over his whole face and near lights up the room. He clips the star onto his own belt. “You mind runnin’ an errand with me then?”

With no prisoners left and the hole in the jailhouse wall still to be fixed, Sam pulls aside the cloth door and gestures for Steve to go first. “After you, partner.”

The snort Steve makes is a little ugly. Sam smiles.

To R. PROCTOR, NEW YORK CITY:

Becca— say hi to kids— staying here— got a job to do— Steve

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Here's an ["end credits song"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5jlLJa2Zhs), if you're interested.)
> 
> > The Skeleton Crew (that I chose to use, there are a couple more) are: Brock Rumlow (Crossbones), Joe Manfredi (Blackwing), Danny Leighton (Cutthroat), Steve Levins (Jack O'Lantern), Sam Saxon (Machinesmith), Melvin Scarbo (Minister Blood), and Susan Scarbo (Mother Night). I've added Jack Rollins to the roster to help tie into the MCU. Now, the surviving members are Rumlow, Rollins, Manfredi, Leighton, and Susan Scarbo.
> 
> > While not overly common, it was not unheard of for cowboys/other riders in the Old West to shear and/or clip their horses' manes and tails. This is ostensibly done to help with the heat, but if done incorrectly can actually injure the animal.
> 
> > Clint's signs: American Sign Language was formalized in the early 1800s after the founding of the American School for the Deaf, but was not very well-known outside of the Deaf community. (This plays into a lot of backstory I had for Clint that was written out.) He uses the signs for "we/all", "fine", and "sister" in that order in this chapter.
> 
> > Related: Steve, a sick kid growing up in a big city in a highly eugenics-focused society, is very likely to have had exposure to the Deaf community during his childhood. "Sister" is likely one of the only signs he remembers.
> 
>  
> 
> We've made it to the end! Thank you for reading, and I just want to (again) thank my wonderful, talented artist [Cee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OriginalCeeNote) for her lovely art, my fantastic beta [follow_the_sun](https://archiveofourown.org/users/follow_the_sun) for cheerleading and getting on my case about those pesky emdashes, and the mods (and slack) of the Captain America Reverse Big Bang 2018 for making this such a great experience. 
> 
> Liked this fic or want to know more about a detail? Feel free to drop a comment - and [here's the tumblr post](https://vextant.tumblr.com/post/174693799306/truth-or-consequences-for-capreversebb) for easy liking and/or reblogging if you're so inclined.
> 
> You can also find me on [tumblr](https://vextant.tumblr.com/), I'm always down to talk more about cowboys.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Artwork for Truth or Consequences by vextant](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14707956) by [OriginalCeenote](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OriginalCeenote/pseuds/OriginalCeenote), [vextant](https://archiveofourown.org/users/vextant/pseuds/vextant)




End file.
